Tammy,

A yoga teacher invited me to a special Halloween yoga class.

I arrived and set up my mat in the darkened room.  Suddenly I felt a couple drops of water pour down my forehead.  I looked up and saw there were no leaks in the ceiling.  So how could this be?  We hadn’t even started the class yet.  I looked around and saw something weird for a yoga studio.  What are those machines?

Just then the teacher came into the class, pointed to the machines, and said, “Welcome to hot yoga.” Oh boy!  At least she didn’t welcome me to Bikram yoga as I nearly died of heat exhaustion the couple of times I tried that.  A minor victory.

Another scanning of the room revealed women in skin tight shorts,  sports bras, and really toned bodies.  I started to sweat even more.  Subconsciously I was getting intimidated; I am a level one “yogi” and they are obviously advanced students.  Once the class started, we got into the sophisticated poses pretty quickly.  I felt like I was taking a steam bath, but in this strange world the scantily clad women were not the focus of my attention.  We started moving so fast my heart began pounding like a jackhammer.  Was I having a panic attack?  I thought my life was starting to flash before me.

I rested on my mat and gulped down an entire bottle of water.  For the first time I noticed the women’s clothes were glowing as there were black lights in the studio.  They looked like synchronized Cirque du Soleil performers; surely I must have messed up their tightly choreographed formations.  To avoid any further embarrassment I fell asleep on my back.

When the teacher invited me to this black light yoga class I should have realized that rather than being given a treat for Halloween, I was actually being tricked or yoga punk’d.  I guess she was getting me back for all the times I couldn’t stop laughing in her classes.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Tropical Storm Sandy, who changed her name to Frankenstorm for Halloween, left the South Florida coast somewhat submerged so yesterday’s beach yoga class was washed away.

Beach yoga classes are important to my psyche.  After a long week, I, like most, look forward to doing fun stuff during the weekend.  When friends won’t call me back about our plans (maybe I call them friends but they probably call me “nothing-else-to-do guy”), the Monday-through-Friday stuff has me so exhausted I nearly sleep away the weekend, or when it’s a must-do-laundry weekend, I hanker for beach yoga.  Beach yoga is weekend salvation.  I love the thick, cottony clouds mixed in with the warm, orange and pink colors of the sunset.  My entire body feels like nothing matters as the hypnotizing sounds of the waves rush in and out.  The rocks that bookend our beach “studio” inspire dreams of being in a vacation fortress.  Did I mention that at beach yoga I can do full wheel pose?  On the beach, the sand is forgiving so I can even do crow pose.  Indoor yoga forces me to wear a helmet for crow attempts; surely that’s not how I like to style in yoga class.  On the sandy shores I successfully flip the dog, well, most of the time.  But if I were you, I wouldn’t get anywhere near my oddly raised canine leg.

Somehow at beach yoga I even seem to overlook a couple of, shall we say, peeves.  Like the senior citizen who runs through our class every week and hits on our young teacher in broken English.  Did I mention that his shorts are barely bigger than a speedo?  How about the drunk dude who walked by our class and insisted he could do the inverted poses?  I thought it might be funny but the resulting sloppiness almost made him toss some pretty, pretty nasty cookies.

With the clocks rolling back an hour next week, I fear my last beach yoga class of 2012 was cancelled.

Gary

Tammy,

The other day I went to yoga at a gym.  After class started the teacher said that later on we would be going to the bar.  “Cool,” I thought.  The class and teacher would chat and get to know each other.  That would build the yoga community.  This was the first class I ever had with this teacher and I was pretty psyched.  No other yoga teacher of mine had ever encouraged a class of students to go for a brew after class.

We did the usual sun salutations and started to get into some more sophisticated poses.  I was getting sweaty.  I like this as it means I’m getting a workout.

The end of class was approaching and the teacher told us to go to the back of the room.  She told us to raise one leg and put it on a wooden beam that extended six inches from the wall and ran the entire width of the wall.  “This,” she announced “is  the bar.”  What?  What about the post-class coldness to relax muscles?  Uh, not after this yoga class.

Apparently the upper levels of yoga involve a ballet bar.  Ballet!  Ballet!   I’ve looked at an issue or two of Yoga Journal and I don’t remember seeing anything about ballet.  What’s going on?  Did I just spend almost two years getting into something that would end up with me wearing slippers with tassles on them?  Would I be expected to wear tutus and pink tops?  What kind of Crying Game is yoga?  Maybe I should do some research before I start something new.  I think I’m going to the bar and figure out what to do with all of the free time I will now have.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Today I was running late for a yoga class at a gym.  I got there just as the previous class was letting out.  I went into the room and practically the entire floor was already covered with mats.  As I walked throughout the room looking for a space, I didn’t see any friendly faces looking at me.  I found some empty floorboard space near a woman who was packing up to leave from the prior class.  I could see she wasn’t thrilled about me and my mat.

The teacher arrived and asked people to create a couple of spots for the expected latecomers as they were coming from a significant distance.  I didn’t see any happy faces at this request.

About ten minutes into class we heard a car horn beep and then beep again.  I think the driver was trying to say, “Save me a spot.” Knowing the crowd I was with, I wouldn’t put it past the motorist.

At the end of class I wanted to ask the teacher something.  I waited in line for my turn and noticed a woman approach the same area and wait too.  When I was done I looked back and noticed she was third in line.

I’m relatively new to yoga and I thought yoga practice was supposed to be a friendly place, as they say, a community. Maybe I’m wrong.  Perhaps the code name for power yoga is killer yoga, kripalu yoga is really known as cripple you yoga, and smokers enjoy ashtongue yoga.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

I’m thinking that maybe I should take a yoga name.  What do you think of these?

From the bhujangasana pose I was thinking of the nickname bhuj.  It’s fun, different, cool, and people will remember something about me.

From the paschimottanasana pose I could call myself Paschi.  It rhymes with Kashi so maybe I can get sponsored by the cereal company.  People could even call me Pasch, but be aware that the spelling clearly indicates I am not related to Spice Girl Posh.

From the vashistasana pose, I could be called Vash.  I laugh a lot in yoga class and the French phrase la vache qui rit means laughing cow.  In Fact, that phrase is synonymous with a French cheese so maybe they can sponsor me.

What do you think?   Should I be cool or make some money while practicing yoga?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

I attended a “hands on” yoga class.

First the teachers said they were going to massage some Chinese gel into our shoulders.  Since we are in South Florida where they’ve had problems with asbestos in Chinese drywall, I immediately became fearful that this class may be carcinogenic.  Shortly thereafter while I was in downward dog, a teacher put a harness around my waist and started pulling me backwards.  What are they trying to make me into?  A rickshaw driver.  Then, while in child’s pose, one of the teachers had me reach my hands forward and grab her ankles.  The thought crossed my mind that I was going to be attached to something by the other teacher and become become part of a human trafficking scheme.

Fortunately my brain eventually shut off, the neurosis went away, and I started to feel a slow bit of exhilaration run through my whole being.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

You will recall I was at your yin a/k/a “happy hips” yoga class three weeks in a row.

Last night I was part of a private yoga class with my girlfriend; there was no teacher.  There was a little mood music, though I don’t know if it was technically yoga music.  We were trying out the yoga pose where you touch hips together.  Out of the blue something happened to me that I had never experienced before.  I felt a different sensation and a popping noise.  It jarred me a little and I wondered if something was wrong.  I thought I had crossed all bridges if you know what I mean.  I figured out that my hip bone had cracked, like when you crack your knuckles.

Is this the goal of the happy hips yoga class and does this sensation occur only at happy times?  I think you gave out yoga homework in the last of these classes but was this what you were talking about?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Last night  I saw a hilarious movie and a few live comics; a late night full of laughs.

I arrived at the outdoor yoga class early in the morning today.  Apparently the teacher said hi to me right before the class started, but I didn’t even notice.  I must’ve been in the “yoga zone” before class even started.  How cool! I was totally focused.  No sports psychologist, astrologist, or craniologist necessary here.

During class I suddenly felt something touching me.  First I thought it was a little gecko as they run rampant here in South Florida.  Yikes!  One of those little guys crawling all over my body during downward dog would have been totally skeevy.  Then my mind went to an army of ants; nope, they race pretty fast and I would have succumbed to their full body invasion immediately.  My iliotibial (it) bands (yep, both left and right) were apparently crumbling from a life’s worth of non use when I finally realized it was the teacher.  I think she said something in yoga speak to the effect of loosen up dude, take it easy.  Be in the moment.  Enjoy!

After like sixteen months of yoga I thought I was totally relaxed and present.  Second thought, maybe you need a lot of sleep to do yoga; otherwise, stay home in shivasana.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

I think I may be  turning into a yogaholic.  Can you tell me if I am in need of a twelve-step flow, I mean program?  Will I need an anti-yoga intervention?  Will you be my sponsor?

I practice yoga with you once a week. I go to Barnes & Noble a couple of times a week under the pretense that I drink coffee and read the paper. Actually I read all the yoga magazines and books. I’m lucky because my B&N has the yoga section in a back corner.  When nobody’s looking and the surveillance cameras have panned by, I dream about sneaking in a vinyasa and sometimes a full sun salutation. That would be awesome.  It would be like my yoga coming out party.

It feels like I’ve worn out all the yoga dvds from the library; I believe I’m now banned from checking out any and all yoga materials. Those cretins! I think I even saw a picture of me with a diagonal red line through it at the checkout desk; they claim I recently tried to sneak out the newest yoga picture book.

I get in such a zone during yoga that my focus blocks out any portion of reality.  I don’t know what I do in this state of mind.  How can I be responsible for my actions during such enlightened flashes?  I’ve heard about the guy who was forced to wear an ankle bracelet because he called the local sports radio station 250 times requesting a yoga class be broadcast over the air.  At his restraining order hearing, I heard his lawyer argued that it was only 238 calls.  I’ve only called around 50 times, but I block my number before dialing.

When my ham strings and quads need the boost, I scan Groupon, Living Social, and even craigslist for a cheap unlimited month of yoga. Those deals are only for new customers but I convince the yoga studio owner that I am so desperate I will disavow Buddha if he/she won’t let me have the deal.  I don’t even believe in Buddha but I know I’m striking a nerve and that’s the way to get what I must have.

This Thanksgiving I will participating in a three hour yoga workshop, thereby missing my family. Somehow I think they won’t regret my annual twenty minute evaporation from the holiday dinner table. I tell them my stomach is sick, but I believe they know what I’m up to. You see, during recent desserts I heard them muttering my meditation mantra.

What do you think?  Are these normal signs of a person doing yoga or am I slipping off the yoga mat of sanity?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Yesterday I ventured out for park yoga. There was a raised cement platform in a public park where the class would take place.  It was a sunny, early morning, about 75 degrees with a slight breeze; glorious yoga weather.  I arrived five minutes before the class was scheduled to start. I scanned the area to figure out where to put my mat.  In the middle were a bunch of women with purple tops on. My eyes couldn’t move away from that area for a couple of seconds.  What’s going on?  Did I miss the dress code memo?

The session started and the pace was a little slower than the intermediate, rush-into-as-many-asanas-as-you-can-do-in-an-hour.  I was able to keep up without a problem.  In the middle we got into pigeon pose.  For some reason I was able to follow the instructions and successfully achieve the pose without teacher adjustment.  My hips hurt in exactly the right place and this pain made me happy.  Previously I thought happiness was supposed to make me feel good; what is yoga doing to my sense of life’s pleasures?  After class I saw that a bird painted part of my blue car white.  I guess he/she liked my impression of his/her species.  With my new yogic fondness for discomfort, am I supposed to like the artwork or should I have done a celebratory sun salutation?  Yogic karma evidently was present later on in the day when one of my teeth provided the worst pain I’ve ever felt.  Maybe if I do the bridge pose when the dentist does my root canal I’ll enjoy this new sensation.

I may have to practice yoga a long time before I buy into its pain philosophy.

Gary