It’s mid-morning on a Thursday in March, and Kristen Formaini is searching for “effortless.”
The soft music, wafts of burning palo santo and three heaters set to a stuffy 85 degrees are all meant to help her and her students find it.
“We repeat things all the time in this room,” she continues in a reassuring tone, eyes closed. “But I want you to feel like you’re really there for it.”
A few of the women in the room sink a little deeper into child’s pose.
Since late 2023, Formaini of Buffalo Township has been helping folks get their zen on as the owner of Numa Yoga in Freeport. She and a cast of instructors primarily offer Vinyasa classes, a style of yoga known for it’s breathwork, fluidity and difficulty, though they recently added the gentler Yin variety to the mix.
Students of all levels are welcome, noted instructor Maria Maddalone-Urso, who said she takes pride in Numa’s ability to “really meet you where you’re at.”
The studio on High Street also attracts a wide age range. Some students are young professionals looking for a breather, so to speak. Others are mother-daughter duos getting active on the weekend. There’s also a sizable number of seniors, like Kim Schneider, 68, of Brackenridge, who are keeping limber.
Schneider got into yoga about a decade ago “because I hated the gym,” she said, and has been a regular student at Numa since it opened. She arrived at the Thursday morning class toting a bag of blocks and straps, a badge of her devotion to staying balanced, physically and mentally.
“It’s just calming,” Schneider said. “You’re only thinking about you being in the moment.”
Another student, Christine Kobik, 44, of Buffalo Township said Numa’s arrival and convenient location “really changed my life.”
Yoga studios dot parts of Pittsburgh like they’re coffee shops or mini-marts.
The selection is a little slimmer in the Alle-Kiski Valley, though businesses have popped up in Tarentum, New Kensington and Buffalo Township in recent years. Schneider used to attend Aim Yoga in Harrison, but that shut down shortly before Numa emerged.
“I really want a space where people can drive five minutes and feel like they’re not spending two to three hours on self-care,” Formaini said.
She appreciates the value of classes being nearby. When she first gave yoga a shot in 2006, her trip took closer to five seconds than five minutes.
Seeking to manage the stress of her job in medical device sales, Formaini decided to give the studio above her Shadyside apartment a try.
“It took about a month for me to feel a very big shift in the way I was able to feel some clarity around things,” she recalled.
In 2017, she went a step further and started a 200-hour certification to teach yoga.
These days, she’s at the tail end of an 800-hour yoga therapy program through the Mindfulness Center in Bethesda, Md., through which she works privately with clients in the same way a physical or occupational therapist would. Oftentimes, she said, physical ailments are connected to mental or emotional ones, and yoga may be able to help alleviate all three.
During regular classes at Numa, goals don’t have to be so lofty. If nothing else, Formaini wants the fragrant incense and her singsong voice to represent a temporary reprieve from life stressors, as the practice first did for her almost two decades ago.
“I’m trying to encourage people to land in their bodies so they can get away from their thoughts,” Formaini said. “At least for 60 minutes.”
Numa Yoga is located at 502 High St. in Freeport. To view available classes, visit numayogastudio.com.