Flick My Bik…ram

I discovered the perfect way to stay warm without having to dawn a fat jacket, drink myself into insanity, and hibernate during the brutal Chicago winter:  balancing on one leg, holding your arms above your head, and bending your back a lot in a room heated to over 105 degrees.  Jared maintains that drinking and hibernation is the only way to go, but I am pretty fixed on my way now.  I am in my second week of practicing Bikram yoga almost everyday, and I must admit I feel pretty freakin fantastic.

The 26 Postures of Bikram Yoga

Bikram yoga is a patented sequence of 26 hatha postures including two breathing exercises.  Bikram Choudhury created the sequence and named it after himself, though the poses that comprise the sequence are thousands of years old.  His patenting of the sequence is very controversial.  He actually filed a lawsuit against a studio that taught Bikram without a license from him, and he won.  Part of the reason for his patenting is that if a studio is teaching Bikram, he expects the studio to meet certain standards of uniformity in the set up of the studio as well as the instructor’s dialogue.  It is to be practiced for 90 minutes in a carpeted room with mirrors that is heated to at least 105 degrees at 40-60 percent humidity.

Most of what I’ve seen and read about Bikram the man indicates that the guy is little cheesy, seemingly arrogant, and very opportunistic.  He is known as the bad boy of yoga.  He has a very outgoing personality.  He makes outlandish claims.  If you watch the video below he calls his book, “…the most motivational book ever written in the history of our civilization.”  He brags about being THE guru and about all the celebrities who practice Bikram Yoga.  But he has definitely played a major role in bringing yoga into popularity in the West, and he has improved the health of a lot of people.  He is one of the few gurus that has managed to turn his practice into a multimillion dollar industry, which some would say is very contradictory to some of the ascetic philosophies behind yoga.  He lives in Beverly Hills and owns several Rolls Royces.  He gets a lot of flack from people in the yoga world of the West, but in India he is a VIP.  People in the West who want to teach Bikram yoga have to be taught by him in his $10,000 9 week teacher training program during which you live and eat at the hotel where it is taught.  That is certainly not the way he learned yoga as a young boy in Calcutta.

Despite all of it, I still like the guy.  One can’t help but recognize how energetic and passionate he is when you watch him in an interview.  He likes to joke around a lot.  He also recognizes something that a lot of yoga instructors don’t always seem to, which is that the western mind can’t just glide right in to spiritual transcendence.  The aspects of yoga that some might characterize is kooky/new agey are not a part of Bikram class.  For me, that is a good thing.  The thing is, these aspects are only kooky in the western context.  We don’t live it.  I always thought it felt a little fake to be chanting Oms because I am simply not there yet.  It kept me away from yoga before because I felt I had too much to learn before I could do that and feel authentic about it.  Bikram says that before you can move on to the more spriritual forms of yoga, you need to learn how to breathe.

I told Erik Ryberg that I’d started doing Bikram Yoga, and he said, “Isn’t that the thing where people get heat stroke and die?”  I said, “Yes, that’s the one.”  Actually, I don’t know if anyone has managed to die from Bikram yet, but the heat definitely ads a dimension of intensity that I hadn’t experienced in yoga classes before.  The instructors tell newbies not to leave the room and discourage everyone from drinking water during the class.  In fact, a lot of the people who come regularly do not bring water into the room with them.  Instead, they encourage you to drink a lot of water all day before and after your practice and no coffee, tea, or alcohol.  Yesterday a guy in my class did leave the room and may or may not have passed out, and I heard a tale of an ambulance having to be called for a guy who passed out the week before.  For me, the heat and profuse sweating has taken some acclimation.  Sometimes my mind plays tricks on me during the class.  Your heart rate is up the entire time, There are definitely moments of dizziness and disorientation, but they pass.

Unexpectedly, unlike other yoga classes I’ve done there are all sorts of body types and ability levels in my classes. There are obese people in my classes who know that Bikram is an effective way to lose weight. Sometimes they have to sit out on certain postures to take a break. There are other people who are very advanced and ripped. There are a lot of guys in the classes as well. Most surprisingly, it’s not all just yuppie white people, either, but that might just be because of where we live in Chicago.

Maybe in the Spring I will lighten up on the Bikram because there will be more opportunities to do things outside and go on long rides. For now, Bikram has been a great reprieve from bicycle touring, and I am really enjoying the workout. I am amazed that I am getting that kind of physical activity of of a 2′x5′ area with no equipment except a mat and towel. I haven’t slept this good in a long time despite the fact that we are still sleeping on a bed that I have to blow up everynight. Namaste.

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