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Head of the Class-Day Twelve at Bikram Yoga Harlem

Posted by scalesonfire on July 27, 2011
Posted in: Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

Am I ready for Advanced Placement Yoga?

The first time I met Caroline Icaza over a year ago she asked me if I’d considered competing.  No joke.  Me, of the world’s tightest hamstrings and the left knee that makes it look like I’m doing “standing bow” pose in an earthquake.  But I came to realize that this is the sort of teacher she is.  If practicing this yoga makes a person incredibly confident in their abilities, then teaching it gives people that same confidence in others.  Soon after I told studio co-owner Adam Roper in passing that asana competitions had become a goal of mine and his response was a stone-faced silence.  I left understanding that you can’t listen to teachers like Ms. Icaza all the time because you’ll get ahead of yourself and lose a sense of the work that still needs to be done.

My twelfth class was my first class with Ms. Icaza in over a year, and it was also a memorable one.  In my nearly three years of sporadic practice, I’d always dreamed of demonstrating for the class.  To me, and many, that means the teacher thinks you’re good enough for the rest of the class to see a particular posture from you again, and that there are things the class can learn from it.  I’d always had visions of showing off my “balancing stick” or my “floor bow” or my best posture “awkward pose.”  You know, the ones where I might feel I’m the best in the room and I’m worthy of a display.  On this day, Ms. Icaza thought that I was progressing too far too early in “standing bow” and thought that the class needed to take a quick break to see my posture.  My arm was dropping, I wasn’t using the kicking leg to open up my chest enough, and I was bringing my body down even though some of the mechanics of the posture had been lost.  These are some easy things to correct on my own, but in a crowded weekend class with forty watchful eyes, it was an arduous task to simply keep my knee locked and start the demonstration.  Then, about halfway into the corrections, something just felt right, and I got the strange feeling from the mirror that I’d done the posture correctly for the first time ever, the way I’d seen it done in competitions.  Then, before I was completely into my bow, reaching for my eyebrow in the mirror, she stops me with my front arm pointing to about two o’clock and says “that’s your posture” in a way that said: “here’s where your posture starts to break down, work from here.”

The demonstration energized me, and the class, one that I initially didn’t want to attend, became one in which I had now decided not to fail.  I always look for positives in every class and from every teacher, and Ms. Icaza’s teaching style, (she’s got the auctioneer’s speed when finishing a posture and starts oh-so-many non-dialogue conversations) might not be the best for keeping a granite-strong focus, but her explanations of movements and transitions are stellar, and unlike anything I’ve experienced in a Bikram Yoga class.  She told us to hook our thumbs before a Bikram-style sit-up by “pretending that you are making a shadow puppet of a bird on the ceiling.”  She mimics throat compression by saying the dialogue for “separate-leg head-to-knee” pose and “rabbit” pose with her own throat choked in her best Daffy Duck impression: “toke jo thoat en run dun en pat jo fahead on je knee.” Whenever I take her class I’m reminded of why I’m doing this-to get better, and I always find something in Ms. Icaza’s class to add into my practice and improve it.

Making Adjustments Work for Me-Day Eight at BIkram Yoga Harlem

Posted by scalesonfire on July 19, 2011
Posted in: Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

No matter what your goal may be, adjustments are essential to success. You can't spell adjustment without baseball's king of plate adjustments: DJ

Just in time for mid-week, extreme heat has returned to New York City as if Spring is a season for the weekend.  My schedule while doing Bikram Yoga is much like a college student’s.  I rarely know which day of the week it is, or what the weather will bring, but I know when class is.  So I was shocked when I saw this week’s five-day forecast and it looked like a roster of defensive linemen (that’s all nineties if you forgot what football is).  Seriously, the hot room is always hot, and that’s the only temperature I’ve been concerning myself with, especially if I leave right away and my body never gets to cool down.  But the heat is back outside, and this week, a week into a daily Bikram Yoga practice, I’m far more prepared.

Erik Cummings taught this day’s class, and it was a serious change of pace, literally, from Miss Megan, although I was beginning to like Miss Megan’s style of teaching.  Differences in teaching styles may seem subtle if apparent at all to inexperienced practitioners, but they’re prevalent to those who practice regularly, and as important as it is to take different teachers, it’s equally as important to take teachers two and three and four times consecutively so that one teacher may monitor your improvements or struggles.  One constant I receive from the teachers at this studio is a strange understanding of my struggles-when I’m having a rough time, they mostly leave me alone.  It’s not because they see my body and trust that I’m in good enough shape to complete the class.  It’s not because they’re apprehensive about helping students get through class.  It’s not even because they’ve seen me excel at the yoga before.  It’s two reasons-I keep my body quiet when I’m sitting a posture out and I’m generally working hard for the yoga.  When students approach any yoga with a respect for the practice, teachers feel less of a need to coddle them.  When they’re not only struggling but reacting to their struggles, reacting to the heat, reacting to the dizziness, reacting to others, and most importantly disregarding stillness and breath, two hallmarks of yoga, then teachers have no choice but to focus attention on them.  The last thing a yogi should want is attention.

Unless of course they are one small step away from perfecting a posture and they don’t know.  For me, this sort of correction came during “bow” pose during the floor series.  I was rolling forward too much and not allowing my upper body to lift-a classic case of being literal with the dialogue (“roll forward onto the soft part of your belly” echoes in my head every time I set up for the posture).  It’s one of my greatest joys in class to make adjustments, and it gives me more pleasure to learn about the yoga I’m practicing than to actually practice it.  Rather than to simply be praised for executing a posture well, I’d rather do a posture, get a correction, and be praised for making the adjustments in the second set.  That’s how you work hard in the hot room.

What I’ve learned about Yoga so far-Part II

Posted by scalesonfire on March 7, 2011
Posted in: Analogies, Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

Most religious and political thought is primitive and driven by impulses that have been around for thousands of years.  In our current society, these thoughts are protected more because of a driving thirst to protect culture and customs, and not because individuals harbor genuine beliefs.  Really, we all just want to be right in the end, and anything that we fear will interfere with that automatically becomes wrong.  Its how we ended up in a society with so many moral and political questions to answer and it’s left the individual with some burning questions about the self.  First, how does one handle hearing uncommon beliefs?  The answer is simple: with all of the verbal fire and brimstone they can.  Of course the objective is to be correct, so any other ideas or notions must be attacked.  Second, how does one exist in a society whose elements are stacked against their beliefs?  The liberal thinks the conservatives are elitist, the conservative thinks the media is liberal, the Christian thinks the Muslims are extreme, the Muslim thinks the Christians are immoral, and everyone thinks this is a terrible place to try to raise children with traditional beliefs.  This is a time like all of the other times in history-one of little acceptance and tolerance, and I live in a country where businesses thrive on selling the things that everyone will both need and tolerate.

The United States is a typically Christian nation that is obsessed with having things bigger, always looking better, and doing more things for show than for substance.  Its no wonder we owe countries money, we have governmental shut-downs, and we think that Sarah Palin is a relevant presidential candidate.  Its also no wonder that when helpful things are brought here they must be diluted to fit this need for enhanced superficiality.  The next time you claim something has been “americanized” to be sold here to Americans, consider what that means.  It generally means that the product had to be changed in order to be sold to a consumer that’s uncultured, close-minded, and judgmental toward things they don’t understand.  Americans love to say “I don’t know how it works, but it does.”  They also love to disregard things that leave them too deeply engaged with things they plainly won’t understand, like things with religious undertones or things that highlight discomfort.

So Americans have a warped view of yoga.  Some see it as being too religious, others think it brings on too much discomfort.  The yogis around the world might come to know this and say “great America, we don’t want your dirty hands all over yoga anyway,” but people who know the business of americanizing things might jump at the chance to introduce more bland and generic forms of yoga here.  Why?  Because yoga makes you smoking hot, as if you couldn’t tell.  Americans have been searching for years for things that leave them looking emaciated, and they’ve proven that they’ll take any pill, try any method, pay any amount and endure any hardship to be thin.  I say its even deeper than that here.  These people will do anything to fabricate discipline without actually experiencing it.  Their obsession with celebrities is indicative of this.  We find pleasure in knowing the personal business of individuals who are more attractive, talented, and driven than we are.  We follow their trends, we do what it takes to look like them, and our media paints the untrue picture that these things come easily to these people.  They don’t, and that’s because it takes real discipline to both work at the highest level of your craft and also have a body that is in peak condition.  Most Americans lack that discipline.

So how can truly undisciplined people be so preachy about religion?  The common person in America will state “I’m a Christian, how can chanting in a yoga class help me look sexier?”  So now, when yoga is being sold here to the masses, those branding their yoga like to leave in all the things that make you sexy, and take out all the things that involve surrender, meditation, foreign customs, and embracing discomfort.  Sounds like “commercial yoga” to me, and I feel as though this has happened with every beautiful and artistic thing Americans have ever been allowed to touch.  Turn on a radio and tell me what’s happened to music.  What’s happened to movies, and how many times can the same movie be made in a different form?  Let’s not even get into what’s happened to printed words on paper.

What we really need is someone to explain where yoga and things like it should fit in our society, and that might take seeing fitness a different way.

Let’s say that fitness was a religion, structured like Christianity:

Classic workouts in gyms with personal trainers are like church.  They’re places to go to feel a communal and existential feeling with others as you learn to do the right things for yourself.  They’re effective for building confidence in your abilities as a person, and for helping you learn some of the proper ways to go about certain tasks.  You don’t need too much of this to feel empowered, and for good reason-a great deal of your money can be poured into this for a level of personal security you may not always need.

Personal workouts are like studying the bible.  You will find a great deal of mental wealth if you can bring yourself to understand the things you’re doing and because the impressions are exhausting, you may approach these activities at your own discretion.  They experiences can always enrich your life if you choose to understand them.

Yoga is like prayer.  Its something you should seek out and do daily, without interruption, with full focus, and in a designed order.  Creating this connection between mind and body daily is what will give you constant mental reinforcement to attack and complete the challenges you face.

Now, seeing the fitness approach that way might turn off some, but why can’t we treat the important things in life this way?  If we’re trying to use yoga to be a quick fix to achieve a superficial look and create an air of discipline we don’t really possess, then American yoga is tainted.  I’ve got no beef with Tara Stiles or Bikram Choudhury as I might with say, the Beachbody corporation.  My problem is with those who have made it easy for individuals like them to brand their own yoga and sell it to people who don’t respect yoga for what it is-an incredibly powerful form of discipline that can consume and enrich a life.  Comparable things are difficult to find in America, really, because they’re difficult to preserve.

What I’ve learned about yoga so far-Part I

Posted by scalesonfire on March 4, 2011
Posted in: Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

Yoga can help you find a lot of things, peace and solutions are just a couple

I’ve dedicated the first part of 2011 to yoga and understanding it better.  When everyone was making new year’s resolutions, I was dwelling on the things I’d need to achieve peak physical condition within this year.  I thought, I’d need to run like a maniac, maybe one thousand miles in this calendar year.  Well, that was going to destroy my knees because I’ve got flat feet.  So I’d need to do lots of yoga also to repair what I’m destroying.  I also thought I’d need to do tons of speed and strength training,  all of which would diminish my flexibility.  So I’d need to do lots of yoga to stay flexible.  I also thought I’d go through all sorts of spells of laziness during the process, and to me, laziness isn’t just lying in bed not wanting to get up, or skipping days because I don’t feel perfect.  Its also losing mental focus while I’m exercising, so I’d need to do lots of yoga to condition my mind to stay on task.

To that point, I’d only practiced Bikram yoga formally (like in a studio, not TV yoga) and I’d done well with it, but I knew that saving every penny to stack up monthly unlimiteds at a Bikram studio wasn’t what I needed.  I needed to understand yoga and what it meant to me and other people.  I took what I’d already known and created a home practice.  This was one of the most productive things I’ve ever done in my life.  That twenty-two minute vinyasa program I made up changed my view of yoga, and a few other things changed, like my body.  My body was slimmer, leaner, and stronger than it had ever been.  I’ve always been an early bird, and it was easy for me to wake up at 6am to get it done every day.

Then I followed up on an idea I’d been cultivating for a while: reviewing yoga studios.  At first, I wanted to review Bikram studios in New York City, but when I saw and felt the results of my unheated home practice, I became brave enough to try different sorts of yoga.  The result was a tremendous week at YogaWorks.  In taking a variety of classes at each of their four New York City locations, I got to try many of the elements of yoga that had always scared me, like:

  • Yoga without a mirror
  • Inversions
  • Chanting
  • Wood floors
  • Binds
  • Unfamiliar styles
  • Yoga blocks and straps

    What I ended up with was a totally different view of yoga than what I got when I started Bikram in August of 2008.  At the time, I saw Bikram as a godsend form of fitness that I would attack and master.  Now I see it as this corporate entity, more of a structured pyramid scheme created by a man who’s carefully calculated his business to scare Americans into thinking that his yoga is the only type that exists.  I don’t blame him, in one of my favorite movies, “Apocalypse Now,” Harrison Ford says in the briefing room that its difficult to resist the impulse to play God.  Well, I came to learn that most yoga provides a deep, existential feeling, and if Americans are introduced to this feeling through Bikram yoga, then the American impulse is not to question it, but to become loyal to something they don’t fully understand and the person who has created it.  Its the same way we can all cook or be crafty but we’re loyal to Emeril or Martha.  We can all invest money but we’re loyal to Jim Cramer.  We can all vote and be politically aware but we’re loyal to Glen Beck, Bill O’Reilly, and Rachel Maddow.  Americans, even with all of their so-called freedoms, have made this an incredibly easy place to play God and build a following.

    Bikram Choudhury, enjoying a beverage, yes, gods and rock stars get thirsty too.

    It became obvious to me that Bikram Choudhury created his yoga to be effective, challenging, and attractive to Americans.  Even though I had a great deal of confidence in the effectiveness of his yoga, I learned more in one week of practicing regular yoga than I’d learned in years of practicing Bikram yoga.  I also came to understand that the yoga body, like all of the lean, strong, slender bodies I saw were the norm at regular yoga studios, and there were a lot more in the regular yoga studios I saw than at Bikram yoga studios, even without the heat and sweating.  The yogis I met all ate better, lived better, and practiced more than the Bikram yogis I’d known.  Aside from the hardcore Bikram yogis I know who take their practices and subsequently, their lives, more seriously, Bikram studios are full of “Yoga Riff Raff” or people who are practicing for some dumb reason, like weight loss, and treat it like a sweaty aerobics class.  They never bring any of the more basic elements of discipline to the practice and hence, they see only a small weight loss and none of the real benefits.  When I take Bikram classes with these individuals and they’re huffing and puffing because they’re out of breath or they’re disregarding stillness or they’re doing anything else that ruins the basic premise of the yoga, I can’t lie, it steals my peace.   I encountered no Yoga Riff Raff at YogaWorks, but I did find the opposite-”Yoga Snobs.”

    As bad as it sounds, its a privilege to be a Yoga Snob.  It means that you’re so serious about your practice that you’re looking to shoo away the Yoga Riff Raff with the negative energy broom.  In a positive sense though, it means real discipline, dedication, and proficiency.   Whenever I struggled around these yogis and teachers, I always tried to do more to show that I was willing to work at my weaknesses because to me, that is all that separated us attending those classes from those who just wanted to look better.  All of these people already looked good, and had achieved that through their quests to erase their weaknesses.  In the words of Yoga Guru Baron Baptiste, “Yoga doesn’t work, PEOPLE work, and the yoga comes to life.”  When we can get Americans to understand that, we can all understand yoga a little better.

    But there’s another reason we can’t really grasp it: We think it will interfere with our religious beliefs.  That’s another topic for another blog.  Maybe for part two of this discussion.

    English Bulldogs and Bengal Tigers-Day Six at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side

    Posted by scalesonfire on March 3, 2011
    Posted in: Product Review/Endorsement, Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . Leave a Comment

    I mentioned in the Day Two blog that the pictures on the Bikram Yoga Lower East Side website were interesting, well they are, and so are the teacher biographies.  So far, this is the most creative studio I’ve seen.  They seem to want people to understand that teachers are real people.  Most of the teachers’ pictures on the site are taken around the neighborhood with each teacher performing their favorite posture in public.  One of the best is Trey Griley’s “standing head-to-knee” while wearing a suit at a local dry cleaner.  Day six at Bikram Yoga Lower East side turned out to be my last because of a scheduling problem, but it was one of my better classes, and it was Mr. Griley’s class.  After two days of struggling, I was in the back where all the newbies usually set up.

    Mr. Griley has a lot of fun teaching Bikram yoga, and is full of jokes and smiles.  I’ve noticed that it’s more the practice of male teachers to tell jokes to keep students present, and female teachers like to be robotic with the dialogue.  Both are effective, and here, there aren’t any teachers stopping classes to let you know how much better at the yoga they are than you or about how they know Bikram since India.  Its just proof that a studio can help their students respect the yoga without scaring that respect into them.  This studio is stocked with teachers who don’t take themselves too seriously but are quite serious about the yoga.

    Many teachers (Mr. Griley especially) say that Bikram says to use your “Bengal tiger strength,” or your “English bulldog determination” but it seems to be a philosophy for Mr. Griley, and hearing those phrases have always built the same tenacity in me that making a tackle in football, or extending a long run would.  With that mentality throughout class, I had my most focused, and present class of the week.  It also made me realize something: I like the back of the room.  Maybe it was doing yoga without a mirror, or maybe I’m still a little self-conscious about being watched while I practice, but it felt good.  I’ve been in too many classes where other students commented on my practice because it looked great, or because of my build, or because there have been times where I just simply connect with the pace of the dialogue.  Sometimes, being seen isn’t my cup of tea, and at this point, I feel like I’m practicing to block those things out.  The thing about “Bengal tiger strength” and “English bulldog Determination” is that Bengal tigers and English bulldogs show their strength and determination no matter who is watching.  The thing that might separate us from the more focused and determined in the animal kingdom is just that-focus and determination.  When animals are convinced that they want and need things, they don’t stop until these things happen.  After a week of lessons, it was the perfect idea to take out of the hot room in my last class here.

    The Washout-Day Five at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side

    Posted by scalesonfire on March 2, 2011
    Posted in: Product Review/Endorsement, Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . 1 comment

    I may as well have taken this class right after the one the day before it, because I still felt like I had just taken class.  My legs didn’t work, I was too nauseous to even describe, and I just took up space in Kristen Driscoll’s 4pm class and Bikram Yoga Lower East Side.  To Ms. Driscoll’s credit, she was an effective teacher, but I didn’t have anything for her in terms of effort, and the time resting in the hot room helped me evaluate the situation.

    What had I done differently?

    • The day before, I didn’t bring an entire gallon of water to class, which I’d been doing all week.
    • I ate lamb on two occasions during the week, for the protein, thinking it would help with the recovery.  Truth is, I really don’t eat meat, at all.  So my body could have been reacting to something it hasn’t done in over a year.
    • I was thinking about things I hadn’t let myself dwell on in class in years, like other classmates, the teachers’ styles, and my own comfort.
    • I was commuting a long distance to class every day for the first time in years.

     

    The class was a washout, or one where I basically didn’t show up mentally and checked physically very early, and I see these situations as unacceptable, whether in yoga, exercise, or in life.  I should never allow myself to let anything alter my presence.  To be disciplined, my diet, travel, environment, and thoughts must be pure.  Then, I must bring that discipline to the mat to create what I’m looking for.

    The Bikram Baby-Day Four at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side

    Posted by scalesonfire on March 1, 2011
    Posted in: Product Review/Endorsement, Yoga. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . 3 comments

    So I’d like to share a personal Bikram thought.  I have this feeling sometimes like certain teachers are practicing yoga witchcraft.  There are times when I struggle in class when I feel like the teacher is doing it.  You know, like they’re twisting the needle in the stomach of the voodoo doll and causing that nausea.  That was day four at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side, a continuous struggle with the Bikram elements, one that really made me want to sit down and examine my practice.

    Jena Blackwood is a nice woman, and she took it upon herself to introduce herself to me as the 4pm teacher when I arrived in the lobby.  I was already sleepy, thirsty (even though I’d guzzled almost a gallon of water that day), and fatigued.  My legs felt like they were made of wet newspaper from the three days before.  After I saw how long she held postures during class, I no longer thought she was nice, I wanted to hurl the nothing I’d eaten in the four hours before all over the mat, and I simply couldn’t feel my legs.  Now instead of maybe working on the processes of things, maybe exploring what muscle-memory I had to get me through class, I threw my peace out onto Stanton Street where it was run over by a taxi.  I got angry.  I turned into a Bikram baby.  Of course man, she was holding the postures too long.  I was too hot.   Like, hotter than usual.  My fingers were burning in “half moon.”  I’m tall, hot air rises man!  Then I committed a real sin: I know when my water breaks come, and I take one after “balancing stick,” before the quarter-turn.  But I slipped, and forgot about balancing stick, and took water after “standing bow.”  Not a big deal to some, but for a person with a set routine, it was the first step to disaster.

    The real nausea came then and in retrospect I know it was really the change in routine.  “Triangle” pose felt like it was nineteen minutes on each side, and I blamed Ms. Blackwood.  There were too many failures, ugly sit-downs, and a couple of lay-downs to come.  I started to get the crazy notion that she was doing it on purpose, like some weird Bikram spell she was casting.  Really, I was fatigued, most likely ill from something, and doing a terrible job of doing the two things key to executing yoga, focusing and breathing.  No matter what the situation, I should always execute.  This was an essential element of this project in the first place.  The fact that I reverted back to so much of the reactive behavior I’ve eliminated through practicing yoga really left me sad and disappointed with myself.  Its really not simply struggling.  Its struggling and placing external blame, and putting that blame before effort.  Ms. Blackwood was the first Bikram teacher I had who didn’t say “namaste” at the end of class, and maybe that put a perfect punctuation on a horrible class with a horrible vibe, where I gave a horrible effort.

    Apt Pupil-Day Three at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side

    Posted by scalesonfire on February 28, 2011
    Posted in: Product Review/Endorsement, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . 2 comments

    If you live in New York City and you use the MTA to get to yoga class, no matter which yoga you practice, it finds some way to steal your peace, and on my third day at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side, President’s Day, I struggled to find a train that even stopped close to the studio because of various bits of “necessary track work” foolery.  So I found myself sitting on the J train ten minutes before class, but twenty minutes away, cursing out MTA officials and their families for causing me to miss yoga.  I couldn’t take it, so I got off at the Bowery station and ran.  I ran into the bogeda downstairs and bought my gallon of water.  I ran into the lobby for sign-in.  I ran into the studio with all my clothes on to get my spot and only the front row was free.  I ran in an put my towels down just as the teacher, Christopher Totaro, was beginning the first breathing exercise.

    I’m not at all a fan of rushing into yoga.  Regular yoga is difficult for me because I can’t realistically build routines.  Regular yoga is difficult for me because I can’t realistically build routines.  Bikram yoga is slightly easier for me because I can make it ninety minutes of routines, which I still did this day.  Especially because Christopher’s teaching style was a little different from what I’ve become comfortable with.  He’s more auctioneer than instructor.  The postures started out with the dialogue at normal pace, then near the end of each he began to spit out dialogue, directions, and corrections like he was speed-reading a stage play.  I’ve got no problems with this style because I know that many people need to understand the ideal energy for all their actions in the hot room, and I quickly realized that this was simply Christopher’s style and that he would manipulate it throughout the class.

    With the front-row pressure on though, and a teaching rhythm I couldn’t quite pick up on, I had a great class.  So great that I did something I’ve never done in a Bikram class, just to make it better-I rose my hand and asked question.  My fellow classmates might have had some mental chatter like “But this is a ninety-minute moving meditation!”  Well I  was locked in and while I was so locked in that my “camel” pose was bringing no dizziness at all, Christopher was calling me by name, telling me to “lift my chest” over and over.  And there I was trying, over, and over.  So before set two, I asked him to explain.  Was I lifting away from the floor, or away from my feet toward the mirror?  I mean, I wanted to get it right.  I wanted perfection and for most of us that’s the only way to get it.  Had I not gone out of my way to practice regular yoga at places where you can ask the teacher a question without fear, I might not have been so brave.

    Bikram Yoga Lower East Side-Day One

    Posted by scalesonfire on February 24, 2011
    Posted in: Product Review/Endorsement. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . 6 comments

    Bikram Yoga Lower East Side. A very cool place to practice hot yoga.

    When I wrote my Bikram Yoga piece last summer, Adam roper, owner of Bikram Yoga Harlem, told me that studios vary-some are “corporate,” and some are “homey.”  I’d already known this, having started my Bikram Yoga practice at Bikram Yoga Union Square.  To me, that’s a corporate studio-well lit and well manicured, manned by a cleaning crew, a snotty owner, inexperienced practitioners being kicked out of the front row.  Sometimes Union Square was more than corporate, it was a place that needed to get over itself.  With that said, had I started in another place I might not be pursuing yoga as diligently now.  I was happy to know that the two teachers in the first three Bikram classes I ever took at Union Square, Corrine Idzal and Ben Sears, now teach at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side.

    Had Ms. Idzal not been my first teacher, I know I wouldn’t have so deeply understood the yoga in a short time.  Had I not met Ben Sears two days later, I wouldn’t have realized how broad yoga is.  He taught my third class, and probably struck up a conversation with me because he thought I was some sort of athlete.  I told him that I was brand new to yoga, and he told me in his deep, surfer/skier drawl that yoga is expansive, that Bikram was just a small part, and not to limit myself.

    Funny thing now is that these teachers now teach at one of those “homey” studios.  I wouldn’t condemn Bikram Yoga Lower East Side as a “hole in the wall” like some of New York’s yoga snobs would, maybe because I’m not looking for a studio hidden inside an office building full of uptight yuppies who crowd up the 6pm classes on weekdays looking to release stress.  I want to be around Bikram yogis who take their practices seriously, and would practice in a rocky abandoned lot or a public restroom if they could get each to 105 degrees.  I also think that studios like Bikram Yoga LES are filled to the brim with friendly people, as is Bikram Yoga Harlem and other smaller studios.

    Really, to me, the difference between a “homey” studio and a “corporate” one is the mood, vision, and accessibility of the owner.  Corporate studios generally have owners you might never see or never see in a good mood.  What upsets them the most is their studio not looking pretty, like some sort of stinky spa.  Homey studios have owners whose main concern is keeping an uplifting vibe so that those who are members are always focused on showering in the benefits of the yoga.  They’re also always looking for ways to make their studios unique, whether through special promotions, special events, or special services.

    So even though their entrance looks like a place that sells knockoff handbags, the front lobby is mysteriously hidden by a huge curtain, the lobby is always a mess of shoes, mats and bodies, and everything but the yoga space is small, this is a tremendous place to practice Bikram Yoga.  Why? Everyone feels like a teammate.  Only a really open-minded and open-hearted person could understand the energy at a place like this without being scared it will melt all of the Jesus out of them.  Its not a religious feeling, but it is an existential one.  Its too great to ignore, and I love it.  I love the smiles and friendly faces, the huge classes with everyone moving at a professional pace,  the baseball dugout-style rest area that forces you to see your fellow yogis as they leave the hot room.  Before, during, and after my first class, I felt as though I’d just practiced yoga with my forty-person team.

    I was even more happy when I found out that Mr. Sears would be teaching my first class there.  I’m a big fan of teachers who can make poignant corrections for individuals while keeping the pace of the Bikram dialogue, and Mr. Sears does this more effectively than any other Bikram Yoga teacher I’ve had.  He is both class perfectionist-always seeking out individuals who aren’t executing, and creative teacher-always offering new techniques to executing postures.  The best Bikram Yoga teachers are ones who simply say “screw the dialogue, I see people doing ‘this’ and you should all be trying to do ‘this.’”  It means the teacher understand that sometimes, in a hot room, with the heart rate going wild, its a problem for a person to effectively execute a correction, so Mr. Sears goes out of his way to make sure he tells you the things that keep your chin to your shoulder in ‘triangle’ pose, or that keep your knee locked in ‘standing head-to-knee’ pose.  He also makes quirky and spaced out metaphors that keep you surprisingly present in class.  To me, he teaches like a yoga instructor and not a Bikram instructor.

    So its safe to say that the class went well.  Bikram classes, my last few, have gone exceptionally well.  I credit all the regular yoga I’ve done, most of which, in my opinion, was much more challenging than Bikram Yoga.  With an initial goal of completing fifteen classes in the seven-day introduction week at Bikram Yoga Lower East Side, I arrived focused, prepared, and ready to complete two consecutive classes.  I finished the first teeming with enthusiasm, and walked right up to the front desk and exclaimed “I want to go again.”  But their studio doesn’t allow doubles on the introduction week, and the staff was so friendly that it seemed to pain them to turn me down.  That night I received a welcome email from Tricia Donegan, their owner, a common occurrence for an introduction week.  I replied blindly, not expecting a response.  I told her about this site, my great first day, and my disappointment over their doubles rule.  She replied, just like a concerned, accessible, polite studio owner would.  She offered me the opportunity to do a double whenever I wished, and I may this week is I feel the spirit, but the ability to make that connection is the sort of thing that makes this a great place to start Bikram Yoga.