Social Wellness for the Modern World
The Uplift Center is Eli Walker's School for Belonging. Born from her acclaimed brand Drunk Yoga®, we help people get over themselves, engage community and spark radical belonging. We do this through our curated, inter-connective social wellness experiences for live events, alongside educational trainings, advisement and self-study tools for organizations, leaders and individuals.
Uplifting culture and re-centering engagement in what matters: each other.
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We Design Belonging For You
(+ Teach you how to do it for yourself)
We teach humans and those who lead them how to get along better + we create the experiences that make it happen. Through play, presence, and science-backed design strategies, we help organizations and individuals create the conditions in their work and lives that make belonging inevitable.
Live Experiences
From corporate team-building activities and conferences to brand activations and retreats, Eli and her team of instructors create world-class social wellness experiences (born from Drunk Yoga®) that spark radical belonging and sustain engagement long after the event ends.
Education
The Uplift Academy offers workshops, strategy sessions and live virtual trainings that teach the structure of belonging for organizations, community leaders and experience designers cultivate cultures rooted in connection.
Street Cred.
From Google to Porsche, TikTok to Indeed, our clients trust The Uplift Center to transform their events and community culture with equal parts play & professionalism.
Meet Our Founder —
Eli Walker
Eli Walker is a social wellness speaker and strategist, solo-performance artist and the creator of Drunk Yoga®, the viral global phenomenon that pioneered the social wellness movement by turning yoga into a drinking game. With a background in theater, yoga and live experience design, Eli founded The Uplift Center to continue that mission: to help people [playfully] remember how to be human together through the art of getting over themselves, engaging community and sparking radical belonging.
We believe belonging isn’t found; it’s facilitated. We’ll show you how.
How We Build Belonging
The Uplift Center emerged from Eli's internationally acclaimed (albeit subversive) brand Drunk Yoga® - the world's first "yoga drinking game" that proved making wellness fun creates profound connection. What started as a social experiment became a global phenomenon, teaching us that the gateway to belonging is play.
Now, we bring that same magic to diverse event environments, whether team-building for corporate off-sites in NYC (and beyond), conferences, company retreats, brand experiences, or entrepreneur communities, with the strategic intention your gathering deserves.
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Wellness for Corporate Activities
Our curated social yoga, icebreaker and meditation experiences are designed to help you foster camaraderie through playful-yet-meaningful containers.We specialize in corporate retreats, off-sites, and we have a long history of working with NY and NYC based teams in the Hudson Valley. Looking for something virtual? We offer virtual wellness activities that build belonging, as well.
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Looking for “something fun and different” for your next conference? (We’ve so got you.)
We make wellness and networking a one-stop solution, and our experiences are what attendees rave about long after your event is over.
We curate premiere yoga experiences seamlessly designed to provide all-level mindfulness breaks for relaxation after a long day of learning, as well as fun, interactive sessions for attendees to network + make new friends. Learn more about our conference wellness activities.
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You gather your people, we’ll lift their spirits (while building your brand awareness at the same time).
Luxury brands, event producers and organizations hire us to create unique, immersive pop-up experiences for their communities.
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Our social wellness programming for corporate retreats is unlike anything else out there. More than “just” a yoga teacher, Eli curates entertaining scripts that include icebreakers for community-building, intelligent yoga sequences for rejuvenation and music playlists designed to foster camaraderie through play. *Also available: Professional development talks & workshops on community engagement.
THE P.L.A.Y. METHOD™
Our Framework for Belonging
Belonging doesn’t happen by accident. It happens by design. Take your sense of belonging into your own hands using Eli’s proprietary P.L.A.Y. Method™, created to help you set up the conditions for connection and build your own social wellness strategy tailored for your work, life, and community.
P — Place: Shape physical and figurative environments where you feel safe to engage with others.
L — Language: Choose your words wisely; the right language invites inclusion, commitment and safety.
A — Acknowledgment: Leverage play to get out of your head and into connection.
Y — You: Through mindfulness techniques, embody the presence through nervous system-regulation that makes belonging contagious.
Choose Your Path
Whatever your role + in whatever the room, belonging is a skill you can learn and a culture you can build. Explore educational resource hubs below.
I'm an event professional.
You design conferences, retreats, brand activations, and team-building experiences. You want people to leave changed, not just entertained. You're looking for tools, training, and a framework for designing belonging into every touchpoint of your events.
I’m a people leader or HR professional.
You're responsible for team culture, employee engagement, and the human experience inside your organization. You know that belonging drives retention, performance, and wellbeing, and you're looking for practical ways to build it.
I’m a community builder.
You run a paid community, a membership, an entrepreneur network, or a social impact initiative. Your people show up but don't connect the way you imagined. You want a repeatable system for creating real belonging in your community.
I’m a belonging-curious individual.
You're done waiting for belonging to find you. You want to understand how it works, practice the skills, and bring more genuine connection into your personal and professional life.
Bring Eli into your organization.
You want Eli to bring the belonging experience directly to your team, conference, or community through a keynote, workshop, icebreaker experience, or live Drunk Yoga®-inspired event.
Start Learning
Workshops & Trainings
Our in-person + virtual workshops and trainings breakdown the social wellness techniques that make it possible: authenticity, conflict navigation, nervous system regulation, and experience design that sets up the conditions for belonging to arise naturally [and playfully]. Perfect for corporate team-building, conferences and off-sites + company retreats.
Advisement
With studies showing that nearly 60% of people feel lonely in our increasingly digital world, learning techniques to build belonging is a must-have.
…And belonging is best sparked in live experiences, which is why Eli’s social wellness strategy sessions exist: to help you optimize every touch point of your next live event to for belonging [on a budget].
Belonging Toolkit
Self-study resources that help you understand your social wellness patterns, practice authenticity, and cultivate meaningful connection in your personal life. Includes Eli’s Social Wellness Quiz, Belonging P.L.A.Y.Book, and UplifTV digital yoga library.
Enroll in a virtual belonging training cohort
We offer twice annual training programs in the form of virtual cohorts for event professionals, community leaders, and people leaders who are ready to stop bringing individuals together and hoping for the best, and start deliberately designing belonging into every experience they're responsible for.
Why We Do This
Physical health has gyms. Mental health has therapy. But social health?
Group chats + crossing our fingers in the hopes of “finding our people.”
We’ve professionalized everything except how we relate to each other, so meetings drain us, events feel like rooms where people feel alone together and community disengagement is at an all-time high because accountability is unclear.
Not because people don’t care, but because no one taught us social wellness strategies that make belonging a practice.
Belonging is a skill, and The Uplift Center is here to teach it.
Ready to Build Belonging?
Let’s design an experience your people will never forget. Whether you’re hosting a conference, planning an off-site, or investing in your team’s culture through workshops, a corporate retreat or wellness brand activation, The Uplift Center will help you create belonging through play.