Yoga 2009: 10 Highlights

What happened last year?

Did it pass like a kidney stone or like savasana? Lots of subtle changes for me personally, and a big leap into the blogosphere for Yoga Nation. Part of me wishes I had a time machine to go back ten years (if I knew then, what I know now...) and another part looks forward to the madness and the mystery of a new year.But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's see what happened in 2009....

1. Fierce Club opened in Nolita. Sadie Nardini, of Bon Jovi yogi fame, not only opened her own kick-ass studio in Nolita last March, but later in the summer she also joined up with YAMA, an agenting enterprise for enterprising yoga teachers. Yes, folks, the future is here...

2. The movie, Enlighten Up!: A Skeptic's Journey into the World of Yoga, launched to mostly positive reviews (and some grumbling from yoga teachers) proving that yoga can entertain Americans for at least an hour and a half on the big screen. Director/yogini, Kate Churchill, and skeptic/subject, Nick Rosen, tussle and tumble around the world looking for the truth about yoga

.3. Inappropriate Yoga Guy "Edited" Yoga Journal. Yoga Journal spoofed itself in this 5-part online mini-series in which the unforgettable, and wildly inappropriate, Ogden, took over the inimitable magazine offices as a hazardous (and sometimes naked) "guest editor." Went live April Fool's Day.

4. Sri K. Pattabhi Jois passed. One of three Indian grandaddies of modern, Western yoga, 93-year-old Pattabhi Jois, passed away in May, and was fetted through the early summer. The memorial held at Donna Karan's Urban Zen headquarters on June 14 in the West Village created even bigger buzz than the first ever NYC Yoga Journal Conference in May.

5. Licensing Issue ravaged New York---and is not over. Should yoga studios pay large sums of money to New York state to be "licensed" to train yoga teachers? Widely seen as a pitiless money-grab, this proposed legislation threatens to shut down many tiny yoga studios that rely on teacher-training programs for basic income. (For this issue, yoganation was also a momentary guest-blogger on the illustrious YogaDork.)

6. On the other hand, Brent Kessel made clear that yoga and money can live happily together. Financial advisor and long-time ashtanga-yoga practitioner, Kessel wrote a practical, inspiring and possibly profitable book called It's Not About the Money (which it never is: it's always about the junk in your head). Read my interview with him on Frugaltopia.

7. The inaugural Wanderlust Yoga and Music Festival rocked Lake Tahoe in July. This ingenious festival blasted open indie minds and took over taste-making in the yoga world. Who said yoga can't be radically cool? Driven by yoga and music-exec power couple from Brooklyn, Wanderlust will happen in three locales in 2010. Thank you, Yoga Journal (San Francisco), you may now hand over the reigns. The young uns' (uh, Brooklyn) got it from here.

8. Celebrity Yoga Teachers---Problem? In late August, YogaCityNYC sent me to report on the Being Yoga conference upstate. The question: Is a media-friendly yoga teacher the natural outcome of yoga’s presence in America’s consumer culture? The peaceful yoga crowd at Omega had a lot to say. READ my final article. .....(One source said: “I've never had a PR agent or invited myself somewhere. Everything has happened because of the shakti manifesting in me.” The next day I got a message on Twitter inviting me to review her latest DVD.)

9. BKS Iyengar turned 91. Really, you need to see Enlighten Up! the movie just for the scenes of Iyengar talking about the meaning of yoga---not empty New Age spirituality, but real internal work, with a few beads of sweat and social service thrown in. For his 91st birthday, this tremendous force of a man requested that students hold a fundraiser to benefit his ancentral village of Bellur. If everyone gave $3, more people could eat.

10. The Yoga Clothing Wars continued with lots of news about LuluLemon throughout 2009. Their stock was up, their stock was down. We loved them, we were peeved. Mostly we were conflicted about the giant success of a giant "women's activewear" company. Good news: they have excellent yoga clothes for men. More good news: they are inspiring small yoga clothing companies, too. More good (-ish?) news: they are EVERYWHERE. Planet Lulu!!

HAPPY 2010, yogis and yoginis! Here's to a happy, healthy, inspired, productive, restful, and OM-ing new year.

Punk Rock Yoga? from Seattle, My Friend

I started this post thinking that Sadie Nardini's Bon Jovi Yogi was in direct competition with Seattle's (new-to-me) Punk Rock Yoga. But, as so often happens when posting, the more I dug around the more the story changed. In fact, it seems that Nardini's New York Fierce Club (yoga studio) offers a version of Seattle-based Kimberlee Jensen Stedl's punk stuff. (Offered by Brian Williams  though his bio isn't explicit about it.)

Created in 2003 (yikes! how did we miss it?) Punk Rock Yoga is offered once a week for the rest of the summer at 20/20 Cycles in Seattle (as well as locations in Boston, Las Vegas, Missoula, Toronto, and ---wait for it---Weisbaden, Germany). PRY is designed to liberate yoga from the rigid, elitist, body-slimming aerobics-wannabe exercise routine it has become---says creator Kimberlee Jensen Stedl (see her earnest, but somewhat rambling mission statement). She covers a lot of territory without giving much idea of what happens in a Punk Rock Yoga class (we're *dying* to know!). It has live music (sometimes), a community vibe, and---almost totally against the spirit of punk---a rock'n'roll sensibility. (By the way, anyone read Iggy Pop's brilliant put-down of rock'n'roll this week in NYMagazine? So good.

NYM: Have you grown weary of rock and roll? Not necessarily, but I’m really irritated.

NYM: How come?I think it’s now officially the world’s worst form of music. Even a mid-level cumbia band in Venezuela sounds better than the biggest-selling rock bands.) Even more sadly, there are no pictures.

So, plucking again from the mission statement: Stedl explains, "For several months while taking both yoga and belly dance classes,I noticed that I would leave the belly dance classes feeling joyful and connected with the other participants, while I would leave the yoga classes feeling cold and isolated. I sensed this was due to the complete detachment from everyone else in the room that occurs in most yoga classes. What I needed was a more balanced approach, whereby at least a portion of the class was dedicated to connecting with others." (That's why everyone has dyed blue hair that stands, glued-up straight in perfect Mohawks?)

"These observations drove me to incorporate community-building aspects into Punk Rock Yoga classes, such as adding partner poses into each class and incorporating more group activities into our classes."

"The more I taught and the more I immersed myself in the professional yoga community, the more I carved out a mission for Punk Rock Yoga: I want to scrub the elitism and rigidity out of modern yoga."

Okay---but it's hard to imagine true punks being inclusive, flexible socialists. Unless I'm really, totally getting it wrong. (What does punk mean these days to Seattle-ites?)Whatever it means, I would really like to see gloved hands (YogaToes--"yoga grip hand gloves"?), blue Mohawks, old Doc Martins, and safety pin earrings and nose rings moving through sun salutations. That surely would be a yoga democracy. Or, would it be anarchy?

Related Posts:Bon Jovi Yogi, January 2009Fierce Club Opens in Nolita, March 2009