Downward-Facing Dog: Adventures in 'Pets-ercise'

Exercise with pets can benefit both animal and owner. (Photo by Mary Bloom, courtesy of AKC)

The benefits of pet ownership to one's mental, emotional, and physical well-being are numerous. Pets have been medically proven to reduce their owners' stress, lower cholesterol and triglyceride levels, and alleviate the loneliness that even the most social of humans feel from time to time. And research shows that people who own dogs get significantly more exercise than people who don’t.

Walking the dog for even 30 minutes twice a day can really add up—that’s a total of 7 hours of exercise per week! That figure is even more stunning if you consider that the majority of Americans spends only 0-2 hours per week walking, running, or at the gym. And that 7 hours of exercise per week doesn't count the weekend runs, games of frisbee, and hours of play in the family rec room that a fun-loving pup demands.

But for an ever-increasing number of pet owners across the country, old-fashioned activity just isn’t enough for their modern dogs in this modern age.

Enter: doga. You heard me, that’s doga—yoga for dogs.

Doga, founded by Suzi Teitelman in 2002, incorporates gentle stretching for both dogs and humans with massage and meditation techniques. Originally a musician and actress, Teitelman was director of yoga programs for Crunch in New York City from 2002 to 2006, where she first developed the practice among other alternative yoga classes she introduced at the gym. After relocating to Jacksonville, FL, she continues to teach, train, and inform other owners about the practice through her website, dogadog.com.

Strange as it may sound, doga is gaining thousands of devoted followers and momentum across the country. These enthusiasts claim that the practice’s philosophy is the same as that of traditional yoga: to exist in harmony with the universe and all the creatures in it. Stretching and massage are as good for your dog as they are for you, and having your canine companion at an exercise class can increase the chances that you go, too.

Responding to growing interest, doga centers are cropping up in New York, Chicago, and Seattle, with “pet health specialists” releasing DVD workouts and even yoga-inspired vegetarian pet cookbooks. Amy Stevens, one of the more well-known proponents of pet lifestyle integration, makes her workouts and recipes available for purchase through her website, yoga4dogs.com.

Of course, getting your dog to stay downward-facing will likely prove as much (if not more) of a challenge than balancing on one human foot in tree pose, and many doga-dabblers find the classes frustrating, expensive, and anything but Zen.

But advocates of doga argue that not only does their own practice improve by having a partner, but the bond between human and animal also improves. As an added benefit, practitioners can find their stress reduced by laughing at the fun of it all. In the history of a 2,500-year-old discipline, doga is a practice so new that many who enjoy it still don’t know how to explain it, even to themselves. But few can deny that spending relaxing, quality time with your dog is good for everyone’s health.

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