Creative Date Week 11 - Yoga in the West

I have been doing "Yoga" for a while and really enjoy being present and paying attention to my body when I practice it. However, something confuse me as well during some of the yoga class I had before. I only went yoga studio in Singapore, but the operating model and style is no different from the west. In recent years, yoga becomes so popular and commercialized in the western society, I actually doubt if it actually dramatically change its original principle as a practice to learn about your mind and body better. Instead, it becomes like an aerobic exercise that people do for showing off the so called "healthy and green lifestyle".

First, I don't understand the ritual of doing namaste at the beginning or end of class. Some teachers require students to do this, though I have doubts about it all the time, I still follow to act like I actually understand why I need to do it. No one ever explains to me on this.

Second, the 200 hours or whatever hundred hours teaching training program. Usually the program is a full time 10-20 days with 3000 to 4000 dollars spent course. Practicers need to complete the whole course to get a teacher certification. However, I found people who complete the course usually far away from being capable to teach yoga properly. Once I have been asked to do an inversion without any support, one leg is up in the air and one knee must rest on the elbow. It sounds terrifying to me as I never go upside down without a proper back support. I refuse to try as I know my body and strength is not ready for it. One student in my class who has completed the teacher training suggested me to try and said he will protect me. He tried to hold my leg up and push it higher without asking me if I feel comfortable or not. I felt the pressure on my neck and almost going to fall down at my back while the yoga instructor noticed this dangerous act and stopped him immediately.

Third, the instagram of yoga with me, me, me. I appreciate people post yoga on instagram. Some teachers I took their classes in real life are big influencers on social media. However, I don't like the concept of advertising the brands of yoga clothes or showing off how challenging the pose it looks like all the time. One time, there is a yoga influencer post a photo of doing inversion on the back of the horse, this is the first time I commented on stranger's post about how mistaken it is to practice yoga in this unmindful way, how dangerous it could be to influence some other people to imitate the same act and how inappropriate to do yoga even on an animal. Yoga becomes the means to showoff egos on social media. In the meanwhile, it is also hard to digest the fact that some yoga teachers are alcoholics and party animals in the real life. The posts of their social life just doesn't align with the principle of yoga.

Fourth, some instructors teach students to practice yoga as aerobic exercise with counting like "1,2,3,4,2,2,3,4" with a background of light rock and roll music. It is just hilarious to mix the HIIT into a yoga class. Nevertheless, I still enjoy work out my body through this fast and hardcore movement but with an understanding that this is not real yoga.

Fifth, the myth of levels. In the yoga studios, usually the classes are categorized as basic 101, Power, Flow, Ballet, Prenatal, Stretch, Level 2, Aerial, etc. No matter what they called, there seems no structure of ways to learn yoga gradually or step by step, each class is always something different that design by the instructors. I have to find many terms and actions online to understand what does they actually mean and what is the correct way of doing it. Also, most of the classes don't teach me about the principle, the wisdom, the story about yoga. So far only two teachers I encountered speak about what is yoga is about.

Last, the word of retreat. Retreat is a western invested word where I couldn't find any proper single Chinese phase or Asian way to represent its meaning. It sounds like a new style of vacation escape, where you become more immersive in one particular activity and preserve some sort of solitude instead of walking around taking selfie with your loved one. Yoga retreat is one of the most popular one in current world. Instead of doing yoga in an aircon/steam room, you do yoga aerobics for 10 days on the beach with sands and sun, in the jungle with leaves and soil or in a resort with bamboo room and swimming pool. What a retreat to purify the body and the soul.

I was discussing this topic with one of my classmates from transdisciplinary design, she introduced the article below about decolonizing yoga, and the video below is also part of the article.

http://sds.parsons.edu/transdesign/seminar/decolonizing-yoga-making-space-for-cultural-plurality/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBMc9s8oDWE

Finally, this could be what the real yoga means:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtbHO9b1dnY