Art of Living Foundation NYC hosts yoga and meditation workshop in Midtown

The Consulate General of India in New York turned a Midtown address into a brief weekday reset on Thursday evening, as Art of Living Foundation NYC brought its Wellness Thursday workshop into the diplomatic setting at 3 East 64 Street. The one-hour session ran from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. and was built less like a standard yoga class than a step-by-step move from movement into meditation.

The format was clear from the start. Participants began with a grounding yoga sequence designed to stretch the body, release tension and create enough physical ease to settle into meditation. From there, the workshop shifted into guided breathwork centered on conscious breathing, with the session framed as a way to calm the mind and support mental clarity. The listing said the program was open to all levels, making it accessible to regular practitioners as well as people trying meditation for the first time. Attendees were told to bring a yoga mat, wear comfortable clothes, bring water and carry a photo ID for security check-in.

That practical, low-friction setup matched the way Art of Living Foundation NYC has positioned its work in New York. Eventbrite identified the organizer as Art of Living Foundation NYC, the local arm of the Art of Living Foundation, a volunteer-based nonprofit founded in 1981 by Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. The organization says it operates in 180 countries, and its U.S. materials describe its flagship Meditation & Breath Workshop as an evidence-based technique that quickly reduces stress and makes meditation effortless. The New York Meetup community connected to the group lists 15,499 members, underscoring how far the city’s appetite for breath-centered practice has spread.

The consulate has hosted this kind of programming before. In 2015, a Consulate General of India in New York press release said the consulate and the Art of Living Foundation were organizing yoga and meditation classes there every alternate Thursday beginning November 12, 2015. A later consulate post described a weekly Meditation & Yoga Happy Hour every Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at the consulate, suggesting the workshop fits into a longer-running collaboration rather than a one-off event.

That history gives the Midtown session a familiar rhythm. The setting is official, the structure is simple, and the method is portable: a short yoga warm-up, a breath-centered meditation practice, and a set of tools intended to travel back into the rest of the week.