After announcing the closing of The Woodlands Yoga Studio on March 17 following guidelines from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention to flatten the curve of coronavirus exposure, owner Sue Brooks said she began offering her classes through live video streams.

The streams, which can be found on both YouTube and Facebook, help students still attend classes free of charge.

"I do one or two classes per day, free to the public," Brooks said. "It's my way of giving back to the community."

Brooks said she is currently without revenue due to the closure and is hoping things return to normal after a few weeks. In the meantime, however, she said she is following Jim "Mattress Mack" McIngvale's example by providing a service to those interested in it.

"I have been here since 2003. I've been through three hurricanes and a flood that shut down the studio, and I witnessed firsthand the stress, anxiety and unknowing my students were going through," Brooks said. "They wanted and needed yoga. In my heart, I felt I needed to give back to the community."


Brooks said she constantly receives texts and messages from her students thanking her for the service she is providing and the structure gives them a sense of community.

Brooks added that a benefit of the recent closure is she has had to learn new technologies to learn how to maintain the streams and making regular social media posts.

"It has kind of forced me into that technology," she said. "I was kind of savvy to begin with, but it has made me go deeper."

Brooks said she is considering asking for donations if the closure continues past Easter. While she has some concerns, she remains optimistic.


"In a flood, I lost my entire floor. We had to rip the whole floor out and had special wood shipped in from Atlanta. We were back in business in four weeks," she said. "I know it can be done."