Best yoga mat for carpet: LEELA Yoga Rugs

Yoga has gained massive popularity over recent years. The pandemic situation closed many yoga studios and fitness centers and many people find a way to workout or find their way to ground themselves at home thanks to Yoga practices.  

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Practicing yoga has serious health benefits – physical and mental – proved by centuries. Studies shows that practice of Yoga helps to reduce anxiety, depression and stress level. Improving digestion, strengthening the core, flexibility of body and has great positive impact on the sleep as well.

Even though the benefits are countless, there is still not enough attention towards what is the best surface to practice on?

 

Do you need yoga mat on carpet?

If you are new to yoga and still do not have your own practice yoga mat you have probably tried practicing on carpet in your living room.

That is totally perfect! We all did the same, am I right?

Carpet is the best surface to practice yoga on!

photo by: @growhappywith_tasha

Yoga carpet is one of the most traditional ways to practice yoga on. Yoga carpets were here before the massive yoga boom happened and thankfully managed to stay around until these days.

If you are practicing from time to time, the carpet in your room might be enough but after some time you might ask yourself: Do I need a yoga mat on carpet?

There is few reasons why cotton yoga carpets were used and still are part of daily practices of yogis around the world.

Here are few benefits

why you need a yoga mat on carpet

Cleanliness

Yoga is a spiritual practice and the best is to practice in clean space on the clean surface. In ideal situation would be great if we would have room dedicated only to yoga. But not everyone is fortunate enough to have such luxury. So at least we should try our best and keep the room which wood be clean, empty with minimum objects.

When practicing our eyes may travel and search for the object to grasp and to give some food for the mind. Therefore, less object we have in the room, better for our practice and concentration.

Instead of outer objects the mind will go inwards.

These would be the ideal conditions if we would have this comfort for our practice. If we live in the cities and our possibilities limit us to use same place for practice, work, studying…we can still do our best to separate our space for yoga.

 

Clean surface dedicated only to yoga can make a big change.

Whenever you roll your mat or rug on the top of carpet in the living room you will feel, now is the time for practice, I have created a place and this time I will dedicate to myself.

Every time I think about it the quote from Dalai Lama XIV comes to me:

''If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.''

These are the small details which can make a big difference also in your practice!

Do not underestimate them!

Get the support from the outer environment to support you on your path.

 

Sweat is another practical factor which you might consider when thinking if you need a yoga mat on carpet.

You can wash your yoga carpet at any time when it becomes sweaty. It is not that practical to do it with big carpet in your room.

If you sweat excessively, you can even wash it after every use, exactly same if you would do it with yoga towel and clothes!

Have a look on the instructions how to take care of your yoga carpet in this article. 

 

Easy to maintain, carry on and store

No matter if you practice Yoga at home or in yoga studio.

Yoga carpet is super easy to pack and carry so you can roll it out whenever the time comes!

Using the advantage of hotel room floor or lounges on the airport on your business trip is great way to get some practice. You can put your Leela Yoga rug on the carpet there and re-connect with your Self!

By having your Leela rug with you, you can be sure that you practice always on clean surface.

Perfect Grip

Yoga mat slips on carpet…but not yoga rug. Yoga mats are mostly done from plastic or rubber, if you use them on cotton, jute or woolen carpet they will slip.

Yoga rug is made from similar material than the carpet at your home so if you put a yoga carpet on the carpet in your room, it will never slip. It will stay steady and without moving during your whole practice.

Implement tradition into modern yoga practice

Probably after deer skins and cotton cloths, yoga carpets played a big role in yoga world. Back in the days when yogis lived and practiced in the caves and forests of Himalayas, they used a deer skin, dharba grass mats or cotton cloths to practice on.

Yogis who lived in houses and had families they used to practice on the floor without anything and for the sitting positions they spread cotton cloth on the ground. At those times the floors were made out of mud, not tiles or hard wood so it was comfortable to just use the cloth.

The yoga carpet is an upgraded version of the cotton cloth, because it is still made out of natural materials but at the same time offering more support for your joints. Providing just enough cushioning to isolate you from the ground but still keep connected with the earth.

Read more about where yogis in the past used to practice in this article.

Why yoga carpet not a yoga mat?

Yoga mats are an invention of modern age when yoga became part of the gyms and sport industry in the early 60's.

There is nothing bad about them, they are just made for different purpose – to work out, not to practice yoga.

The main reason why it is so it is because they are mainly made out of plastic. Plastic is a great insulant.

In Yoga practice you are aiming for total opposite, you do want to ground yourself and feel the connection with the ground.

When using yoga carpet made from pure cotton you are on a good path.

What is the difference in organic and non-organic cotton yoga carpet?

Organic cotton carpet vs. Regular cotton yoga carpet

 Leela offers you both options!

It’s not that one is better than the other, it depends on your preference. We will explain you the main differences and you can decide what suits you the best.

Ecological yoga carpet

ECO friendly yoga carpets were our pilot product at Leela. We are aware of how much waste and overproduction is happening in yoga industry and that was the main reason why we decided to do our best to reduce it.

For the rugs in ECO collection, we are using the cotton looms which are spare from manufactures from big projects.

For the big companies it is already a waste, they cannot use such a small quantity for their products, but we can still use them for our rugs! With few meters of spare looms in certain color we can make one rug – which is great!

But wait, will we have only one rug in certain color combination?

Yes exactly!

And that’s the goal of our project.

Make the rugs same but different at the same time.

They still maintain same characteristics and quality but the colors differ.

That makes them unique and one of its kind.

Organic cotton yoga carpet

Our organic collection was created as an upgrade to ECO yoga rugs collection.

Some of us have more sensitive skin or skin allergies to certain materials and dyes. We wanted to accommodate everybody and please everybody’s needs, that’s why in our new collection we decided to use cotton only from certified organic sources.

This choice can assure us that the cotton has not been bleached and no pesticides were used in the process of growing. 

Ok, organic cotton, I get it! But why organic herbal dyes?

Once we started to build a quest to create perfect yoga carpet, we wanted to dive deep into the details!

Organic materials, clean dyes = safe for your skin and safe for the earth!

The dyes used in Leela yoga rugs are sourced purely from plants and roots of ayurvedic plants. You can get to know benefits of each plant we use for dyeing here.

We wrote an article about how everything you touch and wear can affect your yoga practice.

LEELA: Best yoga mat to use on carpet

Yoga carpet is made out of cotton, so have in mind it might slip on wooden flor or tiles. 

The best way how to use the Leela yoga carpet is to roll it on the carpet in your room or to use it over the yoga mat you already have at home. 

Remember, dedicate a special space to your practice!  Keep your practice place always clean & sacred, even thought it is just rolling out a rug over your carpet - a small detail can make a huge change!

 

Transform your practice with LEELA yoga carpet!

#PRACTICECLEAN