Jenny Gyllander spent the summer of 2019 covered in bug spray. As the creator of the review company Thingtesting, Gyllander had scored an early sample of a new outdoorsy personal-care brand called . She鈥檇 already researched Kinfield鈥檚 mission and sustainability practices, interviewed the founder, and shot photos of the products at her studio in Helsinki. The only step left was to thing-test鈥攈er term for evaluating a product鈥攊ts deet-free repellent.听

鈥淚鈥檓 not a person who would wear mosquito repellent for a night on a New York terrace, so I did it my way,鈥� she tells me. 鈥淚 used it specifically in outdoor settings for a month during the summer, from Finland听迟辞 North America. I try to integrate the products into my life and not hysterically try them over 24 hours. That鈥檚 the fairest way to assess, Do I need this?鈥�

That candid tone is what Gyllander鈥檚 fans have come to expect from , a review platform that as of this writing, but not for long, exists only on Instagram. The @thingtesting grid is filled with medium-shot photos of protein cereal, Veja sneakers, and bars of shampoo in plastic-free packaging, accompanied by analysis of each product in the caption. Part of her review for the repellent : 鈥淚 like that Kinfield added their ingredient list to the bottle, which otherwise isn鈥檛 mandatory for repellents regulated under the Environmental Protection Agency.鈥�

Thingtesting, as 29-year-old Jenny (pronounced 鈥測enny鈥� in her native Finnish) frequently describes it, aims to be the millennial Consumer Reports. She discovers interesting products and reviews them honestly. It鈥檚 a simple proposition, but in a market saturated with paid influencers and mislabeled branded content, it has earned Thingtesting more than 42,000 followers, some of whom pay a premium for additional content, and one of whom is Natalie Portman. Thingtesting鈥檚 target readers are the type of 听that marketing firms spend billions trying to woo. According to Gyllander, her audience doesn鈥檛 want to impulse-buy products algorithmically served to them between wedding photos. Instead, they try to make responsible purchasing decisions with an understanding of a product鈥檚 efficacy and the brand鈥檚 sustainability practices, funding structure, and place in the market. Gyllander calls this consumer attitude the curiosity factor.

Aside from Portman, the most powerful Thingtesting followers are investors who you may not have heard of unless you鈥檙e a recent MBA graduate. Gyllander spent her midtwenties working at Backed VC, a London venture-capital firm that funds the type of excruciatingly millennial startups whose products she would later go on to review. With Thingtesting鈥檚 help, these companies and the investors who fund them are determining what our gym bags, grocery carts, and skin-care shelves will look like in the future.

Thingtesting specializes in contemporary brands geared toward young shoppers, brands that tend to bypass traditional retailers and sell directly to consumers. There鈥檚 a disproportionate amount of Helvetica and pastel. From 听迟辞 , most of the more than 100 products Gyllander has reviewed feature a minimalist design and look like things you鈥檇 find in the same Brooklyn concept store. About half of them fall into the gear, wellness, or sustainable-living space; she often highlights the type of innovative running shoes or personalized vitamins that may already be in your backpack. (Especially if that backpack is Fj盲llr盲ven.) Many of the other products have likely come across your radar, because brand strategists and marketing directors design them to appeal to a specific base of conscious consumers. If an item isn鈥檛 on your wish list already鈥攕ay, an affordable cashmere sweater or a notebook made from stone paper鈥攊t may be after a scroll through the grid, especially if you鈥檙e between the ages of 18 and 35.听

Gyllander photographs each product on a piece of white paper and photoshops a pale background underneath. This friendly aesthetic has come to symbolize the Instagram era, just as hot pink and triangles typified design in the eighties. Recently, Gyllander decided that Thingtesting鈥檚 appearance is a little too tied to our current moment and is now working on a rebrand. For now, the contents of the Thingtesting grid might remind you of a posh general store: you may not need anything, but it feels soothing to walk in and poke around.

The post Should You Buy That? Thingtesting Has the Answer. appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

In trying times, you might expect to hear from your friends, your family, and your neighbors. But I can also guarantee that you鈥檝e heard from every single fitness studio that has ever begged for, borrowed, or stolen your email address.

Gyms and fitness studios have been 听and therefore shuttered to protect both workers and clients from exposure to the novel coronavirus. It鈥檚 a necessary move for our collective health听but a terrifying time for small business owners and instructors who rely on in-person classes for income. Thankfully, every one of those endorphin-filled trainers has channeled their听energy into a new virtual workout class.

As fitness professionals were the first to realize, we now have an opportunity slash mandate to reconfigure the way we work out. It鈥檚 an upset that will permanently change the fitness industry. No one can say when we鈥檒l be able to get back to the climbing gym听or, just as crucially, if we鈥檒l even want to be near one another when all this ends. That means that online workouts may be more than听a coronavirus coping mechanism. We may听have just been听pushed into the future of exercise.听

In the past two weeks, I鈥檝e gotten email听and push notifications from the biggies: Barry鈥檚 Bootcamp, Peloton, and SoulCycle. I鈥檝e received email invites to an online pole-dancing class called Tone and Twerk (don鈥檛 worry:听no at-home pole needed) and to a Zoom yoga class at a studio I visited once鈥攕ix years ago鈥攊n Sydney.听Zoom allows the trainer to video-chat with many students at once, which makes for the closest approximation of sweaty group camaraderie听that鈥檚 possible from our individually quarantined households. The mutual video chat allows a trainer to offer feedback on form, as long as you position your camera properly. But it also means that a studio鈥檚 worth of strangers can see your home, your pet, and the leggings you haven鈥檛 been able to wash because there鈥檚 no washing machine in your building and you鈥檙e terrified to go to a laundromat. At least, those were my concerns.

An abundance of new workout classes are taking place on Instagram Live, YouTube, and subscription-only platforms like ClassPass. Those options are more anonymous: the YouTuber听does not watch you back听(thank God.) But if you want to truly step into our new reality, I鈥檓 going to say the same thing that your boss, your kid鈥檚 teacher, and your book club have all told you: you have to download Zoom. The coronavirus catchphrase 鈥溾�� is听especially true on Zoom, where fitness classes still offer a level of intimacy, even a forced intimacy, although听participants and the instructor are miles apart. It took countless emails from studios, and one from my editor, but I decided to give these newfangled classes a try.听Plus, peer pressure has always been what motivates me to get through a full workout.

To get a taste of our upended fitness industry, I experimented with four different group Zoom classes. I started with an evening class at my home yoga studio, ,听in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, which is currently eight blocks and one pandemic听away. I rolled out my mat in the sparse corner of the living room that I鈥檝e never quite figured out how to decorate. It usually holds only an infinity-shaped cat scratcher. (Which would tell听the instructor and any spying fellow yogis plenty about my personality.) This week听it was functioning as a storage space for bags of nonperishable groceries that I鈥檝e left untouched in case the coronavirus is clinging to their surfaces. In between that mix of normalcy and devastation is my brand-new home gym:听one听yoga mat and a rolled-up shirt I鈥檝e been using as a towel.听

With my laptop on an end table at the top of my mat, I could see my fellow yogis only as long as I was sitting up and staring directly at the screen. As someone whose journalistic role model has always been Harriet the Spy, my natural instinct was to sit and stare鈥攖o take in the dogs walking across mats, and babies crying in the background, and stray roommates tiptoeing around to access the kitchen. Half as an act of mindfulness and half because I didn鈥檛 want to look like a creep, I laid down on my mat and listened instead.听

I hadn鈥檛 realized how much I鈥檇 missed the sounds of yoga. The noises I now heard in my living room were the same ones I鈥檝e internalized over years of practice鈥攁wkward hellos between people who know each other only by sight, deep breaths as your neighbors stretch out for the first time that day, other people rolling out their mats and accidentally knocking over a water bottle in the process, that weirdly airy tone of voice that instructors use even when making a joke. Eventually, everyone in the class muted their audio so that only the teacher could be heard, and we moved through a light series of not very challenging poses.听

Each time I鈥檝e returned to exercise after a period of neglect, I find solace in the fact that my body still knows how to move. I hadn鈥檛 done yoga since the previous lifetime known as early March, but the fact that I still knew how to sink into chair pose or space out my hands in downward dog was a welcome reminder of my pre-pandemic life. I didn鈥檛 exactly forget that I was on my living-room floor, but I at least felt happier to be there.听

For my second Zoom workout, I decided to skip the slow stretching and tender breathing exercises and burn some calories instead. I chose a 4 P.M. class at , another Brooklyn yoga studio, this one with a reputation for speedy and sweaty vinyasa flows. But at 3:50 P.M., I was still making my way home from a tense trip to the pharmacist. Being late to a workout class is one of my top-five least favorite feelings鈥攁lthough I鈥檒l admit it鈥檚听recently been beat out by waiting in a long line at a drugstore during a pandemic. Until I signed in at 4:15, it didn鈥檛 even cross my mind that silently entering a video chat is far less disruptive than sneaking into an ongoing workout session. I almost wish I hadn鈥檛 discovered how easy it is to be virtually late; even if I听do听get some side eye, there鈥檚 no way to tell which dirty look is aimed at whom.听

This time听the Zoom chat showed about two dozen students, only ten of which had enabled their cameras. The screen opened onto a Brady Bunch鈥搒tyle grid displaying torsos and thighs where stepchildren should be. By now听the class was in midflow, cycling quickly from chair pose to forward fold to a jump-back chaturanga to a warrior pose and around again. Having missed the warm-up, I would typically take a few moments to stretch on my own before jumping into the class choreography. Even with instructors鈥� constant reminders to 鈥渄o what feels good,鈥� it can be awkward to deviate when everyone around you is in the same shape. After years of psyching myself up, I鈥檇 learned how to be comfortable in child鈥檚 pose when everyone else is a triangle. But without rows of people surrounding me in real life, I lost my nerve. On Zoom, each of us is the star of our own Brady box, and I couldn鈥檛 pretend that no one could see me. With no warm-up and already feeling behind, I spent most of class in lackluster attempts at poses while trying to ignore the dirty laundry that had piled up around me. By the time the class landed in the final resting pose, my camera was off, and I was answering email. At least I learned a unique lesson for our time: a trip to the pharmacy will almost certainly ruin an afternoon.听

On another weekday afternoon, I tried a barre class from a studio that I always forget I hate until I鈥檓 standing on my mat with my feet in first position. Derived from ballet classes, barre workouts are centered around the 鈥渢uck,鈥� a combination of a pelvis tilt, an ab crunch, and a glute tightening听that I find impossible to perfect. It turns out, movements that are boring and finicky in person are also boring and finicky virtually. This time, three-fourths of my fellow amateur ballerinas had their cameras turned on and framed on their hips to allow for form cues from the instructor. After the third shout-out of 鈥淟eah, hold your tuck!鈥� I rolled off my mat for a breather, peeping classmates be damned. I used the brief break to take my temperature for the 30th time that day. I checked back in听just in time for the more accessible ab series of bicycle crunches and leg lifts. I鈥檓 still sore today, and my temperature is 98.6.

Finally,听I tested out听a new-to-me Pilates听class taught by instructor . Without her room full of reformers, Kontolefa听had听shifted to no-equipment Pilates, and a handful of faithful clients had followed her onto the mat. The group all seemed to know each other; when I logged on, they were chatting away. Emboldened by my week of Zoom training, I introduced myself to everyone鈥攕omething I would never do in an in-real-life听gym. I met a dog, a baby, and a few husbands before we got down to a series of low-impact core movements. The warm energy continued throughout the class, and I embraced the spirit by positioning my laptop camera tight on my lower body for personalized form corrections.
听
I鈥檓听not yet comfortable letting strangers stare at my dusty yoga mat and small pile of pasta boxes. Each time I step into my sorry excuse for a home gym, I鈥檓 reminded that exercise is the one activity that pre-COVID听me never did from home. (As for the excessive baking, video chatting, and working in sweatpants, I鈥檝e been doing all that for years.) Still, I have faith that this鈥攁ll of this鈥攚ill get easier. Or it won鈥檛.听But it鈥檒l be necessary either way. I鈥檝e signed up for more Zoom workouts next week. Awkward chatter and getting called out on your bad tuck are the point of group fitness. So, it turns out, are the strangers.

The post The Bizarre Intimacy of Group Fitness on Zoom appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

The practice of yoga dates back to 2700 B.C., which is hard to remember at the Wanderlust Festival. But听迟辞 be fair, I came in the back way. Had I walked through the yoga event鈥檚 entrance in Brooklyn鈥檚 Prospect Park, I would have at least been given a guest wristband and greeted with听a beatific yogi smile.听Instead, I accidentally walked straight into rows of vendor tents hawking wellness-adjacent items, like free chickpea snacks rubber-banded to a coupon for 10 percent off.听

The day鈥檚 program听included group tarot-reading lessons and a on how to use food to beat depression. The offerings felt algorithmically generated: you like yoga, so you may also be interested in Kind bars. If you were an alien who just landed听on earth, or a Hindu deity dropping into a 2019 yoga festival, you鈥檇 probably wonder what exactly pamplemousse-flavored sparkling water has to do with an ancient spiritual practice. But spend enough time practicing yoga in the Western world and you may forget that yoga and all its capitalist accoutrements鈥擟BD oils and healthy snacks and thousand-dollar retreats鈥攁ren鈥檛 inherently linked. I felt less like a seeker on my way to enlightenment and more like a floating demographic for a targeted ad. Eventually, my free tote bag full of free听coconut water and free听power bars,听I stepped away from the vendors and rolled out my yoga mat for MC Yogi鈥檚 headlining set.

If you practice yoga, you鈥檝e likely heard MC Yogi鈥檚 instrumental tracks鈥攈e calls them 鈥渙mstrumentals鈥濃�攐n a studio playlist. MC Yogi, whose real name is听Nicholas Giacomini, is the Diplo of yoga festivals. He鈥檚 a yoga devotee, teacher, and studio owner who also travels the world to play his music at events. He has , and his song 鈥淪hanti (Peace Out)鈥� has racked up ten听million plays on Spotify. As a 40-year-old white man with glasses and short hair, who often wears a fedora, he looks more likely to mix you a $14 cocktail than to write songs听about an ancient Indian god. But his lyrics are where he embraces the full MC Yogi persona.听Here鈥檚 a typical verse, spit over a South Asian beat: Ganesh is so fresh, chillin鈥� on his throne / Surrounded by incense, fruit, and gold / With a heap of sweets piled in his bowl / He guards the gate and protects the threshold.

The post MC Yogi Is the Polarizing Hype Man of Yoga appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Sitting on a gym floor in Brooklyn, Araliya Ming Senerat and two other members of the describe how powerlifting has helped them overcome trauma. The actual goal of powerlifting, they explain to me, is to lift the most weight. But the sport has also enabled these women to cope with eating disorders, PTSD, and suicidal thoughts. Imagine a 1980s ideal of a meathead, then add empathy and send her to therapy, and you鈥檒l have a pretty good sense of the WSC lifters鈥� vibe.

Senerat, the organization鈥檚 vice president, had been lifting for two years when she came up with a plan to commit suicide. 鈥淧owerlifting was the one place in the gym where I felt like I knew how to cope with what I was dealing with,鈥� she says. 鈥淚 actually planned out my suicide, and then, the day that I decided not to commit suicide, I deadlifted 185 pounds, which was the most I鈥檇 ever done.鈥� The accomplishment kept her alive. Now she can deadlift up to 300 pounds.

Founded by Shannon Wagner in a burst of post-election ire, the WSC unites lifters under the goals of social justice and increased access to strength training. In just its first year, the organization has coordinated five charitable events in four cities. Wagner organized the first one鈥攁 powerlifting meet to benefit Planned Parenthood at her home gym, 鈥攁fter last year鈥檚 Women鈥檚 March, as she searched for an active way to channel her newfound energy. When Lift for Planned Parenthood sold out in six days, Wagner decided to turn the one-off event into an entire organization. 鈥淧owerlifting communities already exist in pockets across the country, so the idea is to tap into each of them and get them involved,鈥� she says.

Today, the WSC is a 501(c)(3)-certified nonprofit with advisory and directors boards and a network of affiliated gyms across the country. The group gets so many volunteer offers that it鈥檚 having trouble finding work for everyone. The group鈥檚 tagline鈥斺�淯sing our collective strength to impact the world in a meaningful way鈥濃�攊s so catchy that it makes one want to pick up a barbell immediately. The first Lift for Planned Parenthood raised more than $14,000. By June 2017, the organization went national. WSC members in New York, San Francisco, Minneapolis, and Washington, D.C.,听organized 鈥淧ull for Pride鈥� competitions to fundraise for local LGBTQ charities. Next year鈥檚 Pull for Pride is shaping up to be an even bigger draw, with gyms across the country already signed up to host their own affiliated competitions.

As many WSC members told me, there鈥檚 a need for inclusive, deliberate planning in powerlifting. Unlike traditional powerlifting competitions, the WSC does not require lifters to identify a gender on event registration forms, weigh in before competition, or wear tight-fitting singlets. 鈥淭he WSC is booming, and I鈥檓 really happy to see that,鈥� says D.C.-based lifter Breanna Diaz. 鈥淚 think one reason is that this diverse group of woman-identified individuals, femme, or gender-nonconforming people have always been here in the fitness world. We just haven鈥檛 had some sort of group that really represents us and is advocating for us and acknowledging us.鈥�

The hardest day of powerlifting is often the first, especially for women. As Wagner points out, even fit women often skip the weight rack. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just not something that women are socialized to want鈥攖o become stronger,鈥� she says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a clich茅 at this point, but we come to the gym to get thinner and smaller.鈥� Even after you decide to attempt a lift, the sport has a built-in intimidation factor: It largely involves massive dudes picking up hundreds of pounds of steel.

Female lifters often commiserate over the gender imbalances in the sport: , the barriers to entry for non-cisgender people are high, and the dress codes are sexist (while men may go shirtless, women are often expected to wear tight outfits). Then there鈥檚 the general lack of representation in gyms. I realized after my own sample training session (I can now deadlift my bodyweight, thank you very much) that I was instinctively keeping tabs on the muscle-bound men in tiny tank tops around me. A room full of sweaty 250-pound men certainly takes some getting used to, though during months of interviews and research, I met only sheep in wolves鈥� spandex and many smiley giants who were eager to talk shop.

The growing sport has spawned overarching organizations like and small groups of female lifters like the , but the WSC is the first nonprofit to unite the female lifting community with the issues they face outside the gym鈥攁nd the first to encourage collective action. 鈥淧owerlifting is much more of a community than the standard fitness class,鈥� says Wagner. Through the WSC, she鈥檚 been working to connect with existing groups of lifters and mobilize them for the greater good. Lifters love competing, she says, and this way they get to participate in society instead of 鈥渏ust complaining鈥� about it from the comfort of the weight rack.

With its social justice goals and charity lifts, the WSC aims to reach beyond the fitness community. But it鈥檚 also putting money back into its roots. The organization is currently to build a dedicated gym in the outer boroughs of New York City, with the goal of creating a physical and emotional safe space for woman-identified lifters. WSC members have plenty of suggestions for an ideal gym, like no wall-to-wall mirrors, which can encourage comparison or body shaming, and workout playlists without aggressive or misogynistic music. Volunteers have already signed up to offer physical therapy, support groups, and mindfulness-specialized training. Laura Khoudari, a trainer on the five-person WSC Advisory Board, has agreed to work as a trauma-informed coach. She plans to offer a sliding-scale training program for lifters dealing with trauma, chronic pain, anxiety, or depression. She doesn鈥檛 want to replace conventional mental health treatment, like therapy or medication, but rather acknowledge that physical fitness can and should play a role in recovery.

鈥淭he body doesn鈥檛 forget trauma,鈥� says Lisa Schieffelin, a New York鈥揵ased social worker who plans to offer group support gatherings in the WSC space. 鈥淪trength training is perseverance, it鈥檚 tenacity, it鈥檚 failure, it鈥檚 conditioning.鈥� Other WSC members believe the physicality of lifting can overflow into mental health benefits. Wagner recovered from her eating disorder when lifting helped her realize that, as she puts it, 鈥渋n order to get stronger, I had to eat food.鈥� Khoudari decided to become a trauma-informed coach after she used strength training as a supplemental treatment for her own PTSD.

At a gym session in Brooklyn, I watch as Wagner works her way from 45- to 135- to 175-pound lifts. It鈥檚 extra impressive when she tells me that she taught herself to lift at home via social media, using a broomstick as a barbell. In the three years since she took up the sport, Wagner has gone from a yoga teacher focused on stretching to a strength and conditioning specialist who can powerlift up to 290 pounds. For Wagner, powerlifting鈥檚 incremental but tangible results offer a metaphor for activism. 鈥淵ou go to the gym, sometimes it goes well, sometimes it doesn鈥檛. But you know that over time that work is going to accumulate. Even if you don鈥檛 have a good day on Monday, three Mondays from now you might have a good day,鈥� she explains. 鈥淛ust having that faith that what you鈥檙e doing is important and meaningful, I think that translates directly to social justice. Every little thing you do might seem inconsequential or like you don鈥檛 matter, but you are part of this collective.鈥�

Senerat is also using powerlifting to combat her politics-fueled anxieties. 鈥淎fter the election, I felt like I couldn鈥檛 do anything,鈥� she says. 鈥淚 was just one voice. I heard about the Lift for Planned Parenthood and thought I definitely wanted to be a part of it. I feel like we can grow, try to make a difference, and create a community for women to feel safe.鈥�

In November, I attended the organization鈥檚 first official strategy meeting. The conversation took place in Brooklyn over homemade energy bars. Twelve members, including a social worker, a farmer, two med students, a librarian, and a handful of trainers, discussed how to raise $30,000 toward their new gym space in a little over a month. If you happen to know an activist powerlifter, expect a friendly fundraising phone call very soon. Fundraising expert Susan Shiroma offered this insight: 鈥淲omen are mad.鈥�

If some women channel that anger toward learning how to lift hundreds of pounds? Even better.

The post A Woman’s Place Is with the Powerlifters appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.