Alignment Off the Mat, Too

Walking is something Johnathan FitzGordon got interested in years ago--I remember him chatting about this after one of his fun and exploratory classes at the old Brooklyn Yoga space. Now the NYTimes caught up with him--as, it seems, have some others concerned with pain management, health, and basic skills of life.

FitzGordon, who just can't follow a line of teaching if it doesn't interest him, is a deeply curious guy. And usually he is spot on about anatomy. I like how, in the quoted passage below, we see him looking at his students not just on the mat, but off, too. Ideally yogis bring awareness to everything, not just to class. 

"Few of us think we need a course in walking any more than we’d need a course in breathing, but Mr. FitzGordon insists that most Americans don’t have a clue how to step, a problem he first noticed among his yoga students. “People would enter with terrible posture,” he said. “Then they’d do beautiful yoga, and listen to everything I said about alignment. As soon as class ended, they went straight into the bad posture.” "

Read it in the NYTimes.