a circumstance which led to many intriguing subplots, i presume

Interesting question, and one I can particularly address because I've been doing a lot of self study since Devi left.

There is no question that GOOD instruction creams the hell out of books and tapes and internet, no matter how smart and body-aware you are. I am very capable of following instructions (thus my being able to take to this so quickly), but at Kripalu when we did posture clinics, spending a half hour to an hour on a single pose, there was literally no pose we did, not even child's (which is basically just "curl up into a ball") that I was doing "right" or that I really understood. On the other hand, most yoga instructors do, in fact, suck. And some teach things dangerously, though that matters rarely.

Another factor is motivation. There is something about going to a class, even if you KNOW it's being run badly (and you might not, for a while), that makes it easy to dedicate your energy to the practice. And this applies not just to the more vigorous styles (bikram/baptiste/power/ashtanga/"yogarobics") but also to more gentle styles like Kripalu.

I would say that as a beginner you would be very ill suited by a course of self study only. As you are smart and if you remained motivated, the best would be to attend classes, then supplement. Note also that there are many bad resources out there, too, so that part bears caution as well.

Surprisingly few. I will go into more detail later, but to answer the first and most obvious question about that, there was almost always no sexual vibe at all, pretty clearly no opportunities for me, and as far as I know no messing around within either my group or the other half (which was another forty people including four men — there may have been in the other group but it wouldn't surprise me to learn that there was none).

The main effect was that a moderate number of my fellow students were more or less unhappy about my intruding on their women's self-help group. But when they got to know me this usually went away. (The other guy was so soft spoken that he didn't matter in this regard; in fact, a number of times I heard people refer to me as being the only guy, forgetting about the other one.)

I don't disagree, and am trying to cultivate it.

Any issues with your bad shoulder?

If it is literally impossible for you to attend classes, it is reasonable to start from CDs, though definitely suboptimal. imo it is not reasonable to start from printed material only — you have to see people actually moving into and out of the poses.

Some. I had several physical issues, the shoulder being pretty far down the list. Basically, my shoulder is now strong (including the cuff muscles, which I have worked on for a long time), so stability was no problem. The reduced range of motion prevents my doing certain "binds" (which are when you lock one or both arms around part of yourself to lock you into a pose — they look painful and for me, are, or are impossible). Also, the heavy musculature relative to the typical female practitioner somewhat reduces my ability to do things like keeping my scapuale fully adbucted while not elevating them, as in an idea downward dog. But roughly speaking, nothing but the fairlure to bind is much of a big deal, and as far as most people are concerned the binds are pretty optional.

My left hallux (big toe) became an issue before Kripalu, and without the cortisone shot I got beforehand I would not have survived. It needs surgery some time to remove bone spurs.

I am having some as-yet-unidentified muscular problem in one hip, probably brought on by too much forward folding and/or internal femur rotation too fast. But that should pass.

My cervical fusion became more a problem than I thought. It's not so much that I can't get into the poses (except fish [as it was cued to us], so far) as that I can't make them pretty — my neck leans forward at that joint (and it's bolted so I can't exactly work on it), so to get my head directly upright requires more extension in the other cervical vertebral joints, especially C5–6, than it does for most other people. I have to be cautious about this one, as overdoing it could eventually cause another ruptured disk and I definitely don't want a second fusion.

Can you expand on the spirituality angle and your issues with it?

Also, though there was no sexual tension, some of those participants had to be pretty hot, right? I want to believe.

The shorter longer version is they not only presented, as fact, a whole lot of Hindu and other traditional mythology, they are actually going to be testing us on it. We spent many hours of our time — which was limited enough that, by contrast, I learned essentially zero in our anatomy and physiology lectures because it was too shallow — on stuff like ayurvedic medicine (which is 80% common sense and 20% utter tripe), energy channels, pseudoscientific rephrasings of hindu lore, our daily prayers (seriously — about fifteen minutes of it to start every day), and so on.

Kripalu literature was clear that their approach was fine for members of all faiths, and I suppose that's true because they also kept emphasizing how, for example, what they were selling was not inconsistent with Christianity. But what it WAS inconsistent with was a science-based, atheistic view of the world, which of course I hold.

So my beef was essentially that (1) they spent huge chunks of our limited time on this; (2) they expect us to regurgitate it to them, not as metaphor (which I'm OK with) but as fact; and (3) this runs contrary to how I believe they sold it.

Note also that no, this is not inherent to yoga; it is inherent only to some versions of yoga. Some variants of yoga today are entirely non-spiritual; even some ancient versions were not as steeped in the Hindu stuff (though they substituted their own forms of mysticism). Nor is it necessary for the more calming, quiet versions: We could speak in terms of vagus nerve tone, theta and delta wave states, left cortical suppression, and so on and be perfectly correct. It just wouldn't be as palatable to some people — but I thought we'd get a lot more of it.

Some. Fewer than I'd hoped. My group was older than the other one — I was pretty near the median age, and it went up into the sixties. The other one averaged younger and had a few lustworthy specimens. But for the most part it was amazingly poor as a hunting ground, had I chosen to treat it as one (which I didn't).

The LuLu Lemon store near the office suggests that your odds should have been better imo.

I mean, there was the twenty-something professional circus acrobat — I wouldn't have minded bring her home with me. And a couple others were pretty delicious. But it wasn't meant to be.

This was not a fair sample of yoga participants, but of people willing and able to spend several thousand dollars and a month of their lives to get very deeply into it and possibly be instructors. (Many won't ever teach.) Then divide at least somewhat non-randomly (we never figured out the details), putting me in the somewhat older group. Also, have this take place in the northeast, not California. Now we are considerably far from the lululemon store near your office, unfortaunetly.


By the way, the Lululemon story is a pretty funny one. They're THE brand, even though it came out a while back that the name is intentionally racist (to be unpronounceable by Asians) and that they went so far as to stitch racist and sexist screed into the seams of their clothing for a while. They also lie about a lot of things and have had corporate scandal after corporate scandal, but the housewives with too much money don't care.

wait wat re: lulu

The brand was intended by the founder to be hard for Japanese to say — he has admitted as much.

They make their clothes in Chinese sweatshops but denied it for a while.

They put out a line that supposedly was made using seaweed, citing environmental reasons, but that turned out to be a lie — 100% cotton in that case.

They sewed hidden messages into their clothes and bags, including stuff about sex and more anti-Asian propaganda.

They also put out Randist propaganda.

I think there were other good ones, but I don't know them.

This murder story is mindblowing. . .

EDIT: Sorry I'm derailing the Well, will PM.

Atak, are you staying in NE for the time being? if so, shoot me a PM as to where, lets get together sometime.

I heard there is some emo behavior going on in here, anyone need me to cheer them up?

I'm good now, thanks.

JD (et al): I'll probably be in New Hampshire through January, and will be finding a place in the greater Boston area in the long term unless there's some drastic and currently unforeseen change. So we certainly have plenty of time to get together.

hoya: no problem with the lululemon stuff. I find it fascinating that nobody cares; even that the "biggest" story is the murder even though that doesn't say as much about the company as many of the other things. I mean, essentially every corporation sucks but lululemon sucks a lot worse than most, in ways that should bother their clientele, but fashion wins over that pretty handily.

I wouldn't mind

Not nearly enough spirituality mumbo jumbo bull****, I'm assuming

Edit: looks like I was wrong

There was something interesting I read this week (in the economist?) about the Vagus nerve and its changing efficacy in response to meditation and emotion. Cliffs: being positive boosted the benefits of mediation, which in turn made people more positive; if you aren't positive, SOL. Iirc.

I also recall my sister saying she did a course on teaching/learning at uni in which the sort of 'things you can read about' and 'things you need someone to teach you' were discussed and distinguished. I've definitely found that whilst youtube is of moderate use for learning, it's only a fraction of the efficacy of a decent teacher watching you. The feedback loops are so much more direct and immediate.

Good to hear from you, atak