The New Hotel Wellness Program You Do in Your Room

In today’s world, it’s tough to get our minds right. From all types of stress coming at us left and right, to wide amounts of technology keeping our heads spinning, it’s a wonder we even know what relaxation feels like anymore.

These technological distractions don’t go away when traveling, (and try being stress-free on your delayed and crowded flight).

Thankfully for travelers on the go that need to decompress, many hotels offer different amenities and programs that help reduce the clutter in the world around them. Though it feels as if there are endless choices, you will only find one wellness program that truly sets itself apart from the rest: Four Bodies Wellness found at all The James Hotels:

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“We know our guests are passionate about integrating wellness regimes into their lifestyle. We want to make it easy for them to feel good and balanced, even when on the road,” said Carl Cohen, Chief Commercial Officer of Denihan Hospitality.

This passion for wellness is evident throughout the “four bodies” of the program—physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional—where industry leaders lead each component and provide experience and knowledge you won’t get in any other boutique hotel. All of this is available to guests through in-room programming on 40” Samsung Smart TVs, making it easier than ever to pursue the hotel’s efforts of total well-being.

The James New York – NoMad is a 344-room luxury boutique hotel that brings a new vibe to NoMad. The guestrooms are very spacious and modern, giving off a quaint apartment feel rather than a standard hotel room.

Physical

When they say physical, they mean physical. Led by Michael Olajide Jr.—a former championship boxer who retired and began training some of the world’s top actors and supermodels (Hugh Jackman and Adriana Lima to name a few)—the focus of this part of the program is to leave weights behind and treat your body as the machine.

I honestly had no idea what to expect coming into this session. I knew we’d be working with resistance bands and obviously throwing some air punches, but it was definitely a lot harder than it looked on the in-room programming.

“This program is a step ahead. It’s not offered in most gyms, so to have it in a hotel is a rare opportunity”, said Olajide in an interview with TravelPulse following the workout. “Being in a hotel is perfect for travelers. It helps the body adapt quickly when acclimating to a new time zone, weather and elevations. It’s all about the right coordination and communication with your body.”

Olajide is the co-founder of AEROSPACE, a high-performance fitness center with locations in NYC and LA, which guests of The James have priority access to during their stay. To bring his intense workout to a unique program like this is something he’s honored to be a part of.

“We have something special here—something no one else has—created through an advanced way of thinking. Sure, hotels do have standard yoga and ab workouts, but with shadowboxing and resistance workouts using just your body’s natural movements, it’s a gamechanger,” said Olajide. “We live and breathe what we do 24/7. It all converges at The James.”

Mental

Technology is hard to escape, even for a few minutes. One would think it’d be impossible to practice any form of meditation with so many distractions around us, but that’s where Khajak Keledjian’s INSCAPE app comes into play.

The app—which we had connected to noise canceling headphones in a soothing, blue-lit room and controlled by a member of the INSCAPE team—gave us instructions of what to do for a 20-minute meditation session on a provided meditation pillow. I could feel for myself the clarity and escape that the woman speaking to us via the app was calmly stating. I even noticed a big decline in my heart rate on my Fitbit after completing the session.

The idea to help travelers de-stress through a modern form of meditation came to Keledjian after selling his fashion business INTERMIX to Gap in 2012.

“Being an overachiever in business was a good thing, but I was running myself into the ground. I had ambitions and dreams but needed a way to balance that,” said Keledjian. “I thought meditation was for Buddhists or parts of Asia, but after doing one 20-minute session, I was hooked. I felt fresh, energized and wanted more. I found I had to take two subways for a specific time meeting, and that led me to create an easy-to-use app, accessible wherever and whenever.”

A major benefit of the user-friendly app is the number of different types of meditations available. Some last just a minute or two for those needing a quick break from a hectic day. Others can be longer sessions, stretched-out to 30-minutes or more, which is ideal for travelers headed out on a plane.

Meditation and technology have found a way to merge with the INSCAPE app, which The James guests are given a complimentary one-month membership to, as well as priority access to their Manhattan studio.

Spiritual

As a former baseball player, I always heard how good yoga is for things like balance and mental toughness but never had the chance to try it. That changed at The James, and Guru Jagat showed us how extremely valuable Kundalini Yoga can be for both travelers and all people in general.

Our group spent an hour going through many motions I didn’t know I was physically able to do. (Though they became easier with consistent, deep breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth.)

This was just one of many things explained throughout the session, among many other humorous anecdotes relevant to traveler’s needing to focus on their mind and avoid surrounding pressures.

I even spent some time going through the in-room programming, found on The James TV channel in every room. They provide the most comfortable yoga mat and enough space to utilize it, and it was a great way to start the day. Although I did not fly in to NYC, this is surely something travelers experiencing jet lag will want to check out in their rooms.

Guru Jagat, founder of the RA MA Institute and best-selling author, led us down her path of becoming a Kundalini yoga teacher and how crucial it is for stressed-out travelers to incorporate the teachings into their hectic schedules.

“In Western Society, a lot of people don’t fully understand what it is to be well. But I do believe people are really catching on to this form of wellness, mainly because it’s being proven how helpful it can be when traveling,” said Guru Jagat.

“I’m a business traveler, and I’m on airplanes all the time. A lot of us are asking our bodies to perform in an elite way when traveling, and it doesn’t really work in a sustained way to make us feel or look good. This program helps change that.”

There’s this perception that business travelers live-up to the classic Mad Men style, which could involve a lot of drinking on planes to get you through a long, international flight. The forms of Kundalini yoga we experienced could easily be done in the very tight airline seats, so why not skip the alcohol and practice something a little better for your mind and body?

“More and more millennials are moving into the jetsetter fields, so there’s definitely going to be a demand for this type of wellness,” Guru Jagat said.

Guests staying at The James will also have priority access to the RA MA Institute’s location in Manhattan.

Emotional

I found this part of the program very interesting.

Ruby Warrington, a British journalist, author and founder of The Numinous lifestyle program, curated this “Readers on Room Service” menu, which will be available for guests to book one-on-one sessions with various types of counselors. These types of counselors include: Astrology Birth Chart Readings, Transformational Coaching, Tarot Reading, Hypnosis, Reiki Healing and Sound Healing.

For my stay, I was able to sit down with Bess Matassa and go over my birth chart reading. Afterwards, I felt like she knew me better than I did.

It was a very in-depth overview of what 2018 should have in store for me. We went through my power signs (Virgo, Gemini, Cancer), my 2018 Tarot Card (Judgment & The High Priestess), and a few different phrases and sayings I found to be very applicable to my current state.

Overall, I found the location (29th & Madison Avenue), variety of guestroom options, complimentary and speedy WiFi, and the state-of-the-art Signature restaurant Scarpetta to be the biggest callings aside from the Four Bodies Wellness Program. Every traveler in need of an escape from the stresses of the world while on the road needs to book a stay at The James.

For more information on The James New York – NoMad and their new Four Bodies Wellness Program, visit them online here: https://www.jameshotels.com/new-york/nomad.