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May 2002 |
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Letter from U.S.A. |
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Yoga purists seek to reclaim ancient discipline
MICHELLE BOORSTEIN Canadian Press
Heated
to precisely 40 C, the Bikram yoga studio is so hot the windows look like
it's raining - inside. And then there are the 25 very sweaty bodies, all
trying to stretch themselves into increasingly strenuous positions as the
teacher calls out an occasional: "Don't panic!" Sometimes
they do, bolting from the carpeted sweatbox for a few minutes respite in
the hall. "The
smell is intense in there," says one man, guzzling water and pacing
the corridor before heading back inside to finish the 90-minute class. To
some who practise yoga, there is something far more offensive at the
Manhattan studio than the heat or stench. To them, this newfangled yoga
represents the biggest threat the spiritual discipline has faced since
people began practising it more than 5,000 years ago in India, fasting,
abstaining from sex and meditating in search of higher consciousness. They
fear that the discovery of yoga by millions of North Americans in recent
years is killing its soul, distorting the purpose from pursuit of a better
self to pursuit of a better butt. Among
the things that scare them: $38 skimpy "chakra" tanktops, disco
yoga and a Web site called Yogasm: Where Yoga Meets Fashion. Car
advertisements that show a person meditating in front of an SUV. Aerobics
teachers who take two-day yoga courses that supposedly prepare them to do
a job intended for spiritual gurus. Yoga golf. Now
a movement is afoot to return yoga to its more traditional roots. To
replace sweating with meditation, hip hop with silence. To supplant
Madonna as the face of yoga with people more the likes of Patanjali, the
man who standardized the ancient philosophical texts about 800 years ago. "When
yoga was in its womb in India, it was safe and protected, but as it
ventures into the harsh world, it is in danger of disintegrating,"
said Dr. Scott Gerson, a prominent alternative medicine expert and
internist in New York who has practised yoga since the 1970s. Gerson
refers to most of the newer yoga classes as "debauchment." Yoga
holy warriors like Gerson are calling for a return to teaching yoga in its
original form, a program aimed at seeking self-enlightenment by training
the mind. The physical postures, or asanas, most people think of as yoga
are just one segment, and were meant to be part of a years long path of
study that includes practising non-violence, restraint and meditation. In
the last decade, however, yoga has been vigorously Americanized,
repackaged and remarketed and spit out in a multitude of images, primarily
one with a hard body. It is now taught everywhere from hip city gyms to
grimy basement studios and seniors centres. According
to Yoga Journal, the industry's biggest magazine, 15 million people
practise yoga in the United States, up from 12 million in 1998. In that
period, the magazine's circulation nearly tripled, to 250,000. A
frequent target for yoga purists is the genre practised by Bikram
instructor Raffael Pacitti, a popular form known as "hot yoga"
because it calls for 90 minutes of deep stretching in a heated, carpeted
room. Founder Bikram Choudhury, a childhood yoga champion in India who now
lives in Beverly Hills, Calif., says the heat means it is easier to
stretch. It also means the air smells like a massive pile of soiled gym
clothes. "The
most exciting, hardworking, effective, amusing and glamorous yoga class in
the world!" promises the Bikram Yoga Web site. The
fear of purists is embodied in the locker room at Bikram, where one sweaty
young woman finished the class and exulted, "I could die right now
and be perfectly happy." Most
of the women leaving Pacitti's class don't know that classical yoga often
has little to do with stretching, and certainly not with strenuous
positions or movements fast enough to make you sweat. Maty
Ezraty, who runs a popular yoga centre in Santa Monica, Calif., sounds
heartbroken when she talks about North Americans' "physical addiction
to sweating" and how she feels it is afflicting yoga. As
a longtime yoga practitioner, Ezraty feels she is seeing a profound
philosophy and lifestyle reduced to nothing more than an alternative to
step aerobics or kickboxing. But as a businesswoman, she knows she can't
fight the market. At
YogaWorks, Ezraty offers the athletic style Ashtanga, or 'power yoga,' as
well as meditation and deep breathing. "Senior
people are looking in awe at these sweat classes, and it's really
sad," she says. "But it's a real dilemma, because these workout
classes are so popular - there's no stopping them. Yoga teachers who see
yoga as more than exercise are caught." The
bandwagon of those cashing in on yoga's popularity is crowded. It ranges
from YogaFit, a company that trains teachers over a single weekend to
individuals like Alan Ripka and Ashok Wahi. Last
year Ripka, a Manhattan lawyer, opened a yoga centre whose classes are
broadcast live on the Internet. It caters to business people too busy to
leave their office and stay-at-home parents. Wahi, a mechanical engineer
and longtime yoga practitioner from Hillsborough, N.J., designed a
nine-minute program specifically for golfers. He began selling it last
year. Wahi
brushes off criticism about the mainstreaming of yoga. "It's like
math vs. applied math; my approach is applied yoga." John
Tunney understands that middle ground. A yoga teacher and founder of one
of the biggest yoga information Web sites - www.yogasite.com - Tunney sees
everything from new teachers ignorant of basic yoga terminology to those
who want to know if yoga can reduce knee flab. While
he understands purists' desire to aim for total self-realization, Tunney
thinks it may be unrealistic to create the ideal cocoon in a busy life. "I
treat it as a spiritual discipline, but that doesn't mean I expect to be a
long-bearded swami sitting on a mountain. For me, yoga is about being in
the world." That said, he thinks the spiritual benefits of yoga sneak
up on even those on a quest for a toned tummy. "The
thing about yoga is that it works whether you believe in it or not,"
said Tunney, of West Orange, N.J. But
the movement to revive yoga's classic principles is on. The
Yoga Alliance, a group of prominent yoga teachers, launched a formal
registry of trained teachers in 1997. Teachers who have the alliance stamp
must have at least 200 hours of training, including 30 hours of philosophy
and their own teacher - something closer to the ancient system of
apprenticing. Even
in mainstream Yoga Journal, an ad reminds readers: 'Asana is just the
beginning,' while a letter to the editor asks why the magazine uses
photographs of women who "look like they belong in
Cosmopolitan." The author closes with: "I wonder what the
ancients would think of this?" Concern
about the future of yoga is also coming from the home of its past, India. Several
prominent conferences there in recent years have focused on how to bring
yoga back to its roots. Subodh Tiwari, administrator of the Kaivalyadhama
Yoga Institute in Lonavala, India, said leaders from most different yoga
wings agreed in 1998 to promote yoga in its authentic form. "We
can't modify yoga to suit persons, because persons have various
personalities and we can't change it according to each and every
person," he said from Lonavala. Tiwari
said the practice of newfangled, sweat-oriented yoga has bounced back
overseas to India. At
the Chicago branch of Sivananda, one of the most traditional yoga schools,
director Chandrashekara is reluctant to criticize the new yoga classes.
After all, he says, "being judgmental isn't good for our
health." However, he offers his opinion in an apt metaphor: "To call these classes yoga, it's really a stretch."
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