Tammy,

Recently I tried something new in your yoga class.  I wanted to really get into whatever it is that real yoga people, yogis, experience while practicing.

It was right after you gave the first instruction that I tried my new yoga accessory, eyes closed during class.  I didn’t know what to expect but I was hoping for peace, friendliness, enlightenment, and exhilaration.  You started the classes and physically I could achieve most of the poses without looking; however, a weightless, stress-free, soothing state of being failed to arrive.  I was far from fantasy land.  Rather my thoughts were totally occupied by sweat washing all over my body.  My nose was now in full bloom as the remaining senses compensate for any missing.   To make matters worse, I was trying to concentrate on exclusively breathing through my nose, ujjayi style.  The lovely fragrance I perceived was that of a men’s locker room.  The studio is clean and I know it wasn’t me, so how could the pungent odor have appeared so soon after the class started?  Wait a second, could it have been me?  You’ve never said anything, though, you are diplomatically polite and try to run away from me after class.  With all this swimming in my mind, I opened my eyes to try tree pose.  I guess the land of hopes and dreams doesn’t include balance as my body resembled a weeping willow during a hurricane.  Marking a conclusion to the experiment, the body of one of my mat neighbors was a little late in celebrating New Year’s Eve and my nose received an inauspicious welcome to 2012.

If this is what people rave about yoga, maybe I should take up internet stair climbing.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Last night I was watching a movie on tv.  A commercial came on for an allergy medication.  The actress was doing downward dog and a canine approached her.  It was ironic and funny,well, if you’re into yoga.

What other poses could be shown on tv?

For an insurance company commercial:  how about while the actress is in plank pose, a thief removes her diamond tennis bracelet?

For a Spike TV promo:  how about a dog peeing on an actress in tree pose?

A promo for one of those Saturday morning fishing shows on Versus:  how about while the actress does fish pose at beach yoga, a trout washes ashore near the yoga mat?  What is the Sanskrit word for gooey and smelly?  The actress then starts doing pranayamic breathing with her fingers on her nostrils.

For a Law & Order crime:  How about a car-jacking scene in Times Square with the jumbotron in the background showing full wheel pose?

How about during the writing of these emails someone does a headstand near me and asks why nobody else has come up with these ideas?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

I’m a little perplexed and a little embarrassed as I didn’t know how to handle a situation in class today.

As you have told us, yoga is non-competitive, even with one’s self. Recently you’ve noticed that I’ve been pretty close to the poses you have described and told us to get into. I’m even keeping up with the class as we go a little faster, or as the yoga world says flowing. I’m holding Warrior I and II poses longer than I used to.

Today, you found me in the plow pose, but everybody else was in the next pose, shoulder stand. I think I deserve a mulligan, a pass, or even a special compensation. How do I say this? You see, while doing the plow pose, somebody behind me must have been visualizing a mushroom farm because all of a sudden I heard a noise. Some people might say there was a little crop dusting going on. A short time later there was confirmation of what I heard the first time. Just when I was trying to refocus on what you were saying, a third, shall I say, explosion occurred. You caught me in the plow pose with my back on the ground, legs stretched over my head, and most importantly my knees in my face for, diplomatically, sensory, and olfactory protection. How could I explain this when you came by and asked why I was lagging behind the others?

At the beginning of class, you said that we are not supposed to expect anything. You have always told us not to be judgmental. I was dumbfounded. The auditory shock and fear of an oddly flavored draft arriving in my direction left me confused. What is one supposed to do?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

It was really hot tonight in your class.  We were 15 minutes into the class and I had to take off my shirt.  It’s taken me awhile but I think I may have gotten over the body image and body hair neuroses; even if I didn’t, we were now talking about avoiding heat exhaustion.   I am sure the other students were overheating too and didn’t have the chance to worry about my skeletal deformities.  As a guy I was pretty lucky that I had the luxury of going topless.  Sorry ladies, you get revenge when I exit the studio and regular people see me in yoga clothing.  I was thinking that if it was this hot, I should be getting a tan.  Perhaps the the studio should invest in some tanning lamps.

Without a shirt it was still pretty unbearable.  I  felt delusional and then all of a sudden I was doing Warrior III.  I had been trying that pose with you for months and now my dehydrated brain didn’t have the chance to think about any balance or fear issues.  I just followed your instructions and nothing else claimed any cerebral space.  All I had to do was look over at you and imitate what you were doing.  It was monkey see, monkey do.

If your yoga studio does change over to heated classes, I think they should serve cold beers after such an experience.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

At the end of today’s class you said, “yoga is love.” It’s hard to think a couple could meet in a yoga class. The mate selection process is a little different, if not impossible, that’s for sure.

The women are all decked out in their designer yoga capri pants and matching tops with coordinated sport bras; whereas the guys are in raggy, baggy basketball shorts, tailored cut off shirts (not), and the highly erotic sweat bands. Most guys sweat like crazy so I don’t think any woman would be dreaming about an aromatically rank shower during a mating activity. In fact, one day as I was leaving class I heard one woman say that some guy was cute, but then she laughed and called him stinky dinky doo.   Somehow I don’t think that was an endearing pet name.

If a guy could get by this obstacle, what would be a great pickup line in yoga class? “You’re so hot we should do our own bikram yoga practice, just you and me.” Or, “when I meditate I only focus on you; are you thinking about me?” What about: “I love the way you pose; was that just for me?” Somehow I don’t think any woman would date such a guy. So tell me, what’s love got to do with yoga?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Today I went to your yin a/k/a happy hips class.

At the beginning of class you played a song that made us feel like we were in exotic Costa Rica.  Wow!  I remembered that you had scheduled a yoga trip there.  I had never heard of a commercial in a yoga class before and I am sure the creators of yoga were rolling over in their graves.  Those old guys; how were there hips?  I didn’t care about the subliminal message; I loved the music as my mind went on a scenic meditation that yoga hadn’t yet come close to delivering.

Then it came time to get hip and I’m not talking Edward Burns type hip.  You started with a three minute king pigeon.  My hips were hemorrhaging more than an alcoholic with the DTs.  A short time later it was the firefly pose.  The hips were burning and screaming like the towering inferno.  In the frog position I wanted to leap right the heck out the back door into a pool of soothing jello.  Why do you call it happy hips?

As far as your yoga vacation in Costa Rica, the water skiing, zip lining, and snorkeling, really sound like a dream.  For what we now know will be killer yoga, I am not yet ready to have my remains sent back to the States in a yoga body bag.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

Shortly before 5 at night I put my mat on the sand.  The teacher started the class.  I quickly realized the restaurant behind the beach had a guitarist playing an Eagles song.  To the right there were volleyball courts full with games going.  In front of me I saw the green water, the white-capped waves, the horizon, the kite surfers, the regular surfers, and the sun tanners playing in the water.  While you might suspect this could be an ADHD moment, everything seemed to be in slow motion.  The soundtrack in my head was the sound of the waves crashing.  Oh yeah, we did some poses but I couldn’t tell you what they were or how I did them.   Would you call this nirvanic yoga?

No, I didn’t have a shot of Jager before the class.

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

In Today’s class we were doing triangle pose.  When I looked up I saw something I had never before seen in class.  Through the window I saw a red light out in the main road, at a distance.  Was it a sign that I should stop doing yoga?  Was it the Amsterdam red light district?  Tis the season so was it the ghost of Rudolph?

I bet all of your other students think the same thing upon viewing this yogic distraction, right?  On second thought, I bet all of your other students see a green light, don’t they?  They see positive things, and I, well….  Next year, if I do 10,000  downward dogs, say om in every sentence I speak, and wear only yoga clothing, will I become enlightened?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

I think something is wrong and I’m a little embarrassed to admit this to you.

In your class, I like to hear the sanskrit words you say as we go into each pose.  I don’t know what is going on but something about the language turns me on; no, not like a fetish or anything.  This language is probably thousands of years old and you probably can’t have a conversation in it.  I guess I’m an information junkie and love to store stuff, but why this outdated language?  Does yoga do this to other people?  Once in a while I think about saying padangustasana in my real, non-yoga life.  What freakish looks I would get if I actually said this to say, my mechanic.  I don’t even know what it technically means beyond being a yoga pose.  I like to try to guess the names of the poses as we go into them. What is going on?  Why does my brain want to say trikonasana?  I have no desire to be a yoga teacher; at the rate I’m learning at, that wouldn’t happen for a few light years anyway.  Is there a doctor you can recommend that would know what is going on?  I can’t be in a business meeting and all of a sudden out of my mouth rolls the word utkatasana.  What if a client does yoga and hears this oddly placed word?  I don’t think they’d find it funny for me to command that they get off their leather seats and do the chair pose for the rest of the meeting.   How about halasana (plow pose)?  They might even think I am suggesting that they do this pose so I can tie them up in some sick way, take pictures to extort them later, or to rob them.  Someone who doesn’t know yoga may think I am tripping, having a stroke, or I am terrorizing them.  Speaking of which, what if I was at the airport in front of a TSA officer?

Is this what happens to people who take yoga or have I meditated my way into a yoga form of tourette’s syndrome?  Help!  Do I need meds?  Some camomile?  A cleansing by Deepak Chopra?

Gary Kahn

Tammy,

At one of your yoga classes I noticed a teacher in training was shirtless. I was wondering if I should be topless too.

What will people think of my body? I’m slender but not ripped like an MMA fighter. I don’t have any cool yoga tattoos so my cred will be pretty suspect. My continuous river of sweat will be pretty visible and I’m sure that’s not an attractive feature; not to mention the slipping and sliding that will occur when we do tree, sphinx, seal or any other poses on or off the mat. I do have some body hair; is that something  I need to take care of? Do you recommend shaving, waxing, or the apparent latest craze, laser removal? Obviously I’m not up on the latest self-maintenance trends. On the positive side I have neither any body deformities nor any weird colored body splotches. I have an innie belly button. How does that fit in the scale of corporal assessment?

Does yoga actually chisel the body? If I became a yoga fanatic would I feel comfortable going shirtless? Maybe I should become a yoga teacher and then I’d get a smoking body, right? I mean you have the ideal body; can I achieve that? Well, for a guy of course.

Perhaps the real question is why I am wondering what other people will think about my body. I know yoga teaches us to be non-judgmental but you still don’t want to be the smelly guy every one avoids placing their mat near, the repulsive guy that distracts others from class, or the hairy baboon that should be quarantined in a zoo rather than taking a yoga class.

Gary Kahn