Beyond Yoga

BlisteredWhippet · Intermediate Crude Joined: Feb 08, 2005 Posts: 839

I think Yoga is great & all, but the concrete knowledge of actual muscles and how they are laid out is invaluable and has increased my understanding immensely. Yoga is kind of like a phenomenal 'Best Guess" made 6000 years ago by people who didn't necessarily know what they were working with. Now I can know specifically what muscle is sore, and how it works mechanically so isolating a stretch is easier.

Yoga's contribution is breathing and meditation. Yoga literally means "the expansion of consciousness by directed meditation." The physical aspect is simply stretching. The bottom line is that, until physicians vivisected the human body, the communicable reality of muscular mechanics is vague.

How bizarre it seems to me that we have classes in primary school that we make children attend where they jump through hoops all day but learn absolutely zero about anatomy & physiology. Yogic meditation and poses work, but without the underlying theory, the physical sensations of hyperextension and hyperflexion, for example, can't be understood. People do hurt themselves stretching. Yoga is not like sports medicine. Sports medicine includes a constant awareness of limits and technique. Yoga is presented as a spiritual discipline without a rationale for its physical component, or at best, a conceptual, imaginative rationale- which does lower the bar for entry as opposed to the deceptively complex nature of scientific explanation. That said, scientific understanding combined with Yogic practice closes those gaps in practice and the benefits of practice are boosted even further. I always felt, with Yoga, after a certain point, you hit a wall of diminishing returns. Scientific understanding IS the doorway in the wall leading to greater returns, not more and more complicated and complex pretzelized asanas, which, without some sort of concrete conceptual basis are an open-door invite for stretching injuries. If Yoga causes or has caused discomfort or injury, scientific knowledge of anatomy will go far in explaining the causes and cures by illuminating limits.

Some Yoga poses, I think, are aggressively beyond the capability of most people. The benefit of my experience for newbies is this: learn the theory of movement through anatomy, and experience the Yogic practice with this in mind. Injury seems inevitable if you adopt the transcendentalist mentality that your mind is everything, and your body's limitations just a roadblock to be ignored and blown past. Some forms, Bikram "Hot Yoga" in particular, favor this kind of belligerent, fast-forward mind-over-body approach, and I caution newbies to be aware of this. Bikram's own philosophy is absolutist. And one should never trust anyone who owns more than 20 Rolls Royces and claims his brand of Yoga is the "McDonalds" of Yoga, and makes arguments appealing to traditional knowledge, like that his (copyright) series and poses are the "true and correct" ones and one should not deviate from the practice because it is 4000 years old and was written in sanskrit by uber-Yogis who had acheived dizzying hieghts of expanded consciousness.

One doesn't need Yoga to stretch. But stretching does gain an essential mental component from Yoga. The east-west sythesis of both opens up new possibilities for both and opens a pathway toward greater understanding.

Stretching Anatomy - amazon

thuja · Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:04 pm Post subject: Re: Beyond Yoga

Not at all sure what this has to do with peak oil, but as a long time yoga practitioner, I'd have to agree that the physical discipline of yoga can lead a number of novices (and long time practioners) towards injury if you let your ego, ambition and competitive side take over. Bikram yoga is indeed an example of an absolutist, rigid and extreme practice that I generally think people should steer clear of. Bikram himself is an asshole as well.

Just pondering a bit of the Peak Oil connection- at the core true yoga is about conservation of breath and energy. This energy is then devoted towards the liberation of the mind and spirit towards realization, or oneness with God. The physical discipline of yoga (hatha) is only one branch of Patanjali's eight limbed path. The others all concern the notion of control and concentration. Once the energies can be mastered, they can then be chanelled in a fulfilling and liberating way.

Begining students of yoga are a lot like Americans. They thrash and shake and breathe erratically and are often prone to excessive competition and end up getting injured or lose interest. In the years to come we will need to become a lot more like yogis. We will need to do less, expend less and conserve more energy. We will need to use the little energy we do have in specific and positive ways- not wasteful and erratic ways.

Yoga is a wonderful dicipline for post peak because it does not require massive gyms with expensive machines that require tons of electricity. It simply requires a clean space and perhaps a mat to roll out on. Yoga teaches flexibility, stamina, strength and balance, as well as honing concentration and centeredness.

Anyways, just a few thoughts to add to the review.

Heineken · Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:22 pm Post subject: Re: Beyond Yoga

I value the simplicity and relaxation of yoga (which I have practiced for several decades). To me yoga is simply doing and being, not thinking and analyzing.

A few basic principles are sufficient to avoid injury, IMO---like not straining or forcing, and taking things very gradually. A little basic instruction, either in a class, with a videotape, or with a book is also advisable.

Turning yoga into a complex, scientific, theory-bound discipline does not appeal to me.

To each his own, though.
_________________
"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog

"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother

Micki · Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 10:22 pm Post subject: Re: Beyond Yoga

neocone · Heavy Crude Joined: Sep 23, 2006 Posts: 207

Rockclimbing does it for me... you stretch well under the influence of fear of heights and adrenaline to save your life. Kind of a primeval thing.

Yoga controls breathing, which is acting on the primitive and animalistic buttons of human psychology.

Now back to Peak Oil: I think Yoga and "organic" cuisine and "whole foods" will be feel good and pricey trends for the clueless elites and overindulged American population to think they actually do something. Like a hamster running fast on that wheel.

For all those idiots buying hybrids... if all the US car fleet changed to hybrids we would save... 1% of gas.

How about you actually go on a farm and live on a commune like in the 60s, plow the land with your bare hands and ditch electricity.

Also live like an Amish and forgo money, 401ks and other idiotic trinkets soon obsolete and based on paper money that will only be useful as toilet paper once the government collapse.

Get rid of the f**** car too.

Like Cromwell said... first and foremost my friends let's kill all the cars!!!!!!!! Let's burn them, let's destroy that idol of degeneration and destruction, that symbol of Death.

Remember that Auszwitz started with cars and trucks hooking up their tailpipes to the gas chambers...

BlisteredWhippet · Intermediate Crude Joined: Feb 08, 2005 Posts: 839

Heineken · Posted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 8:18 am Post subject: Re: Beyond Yoga

I'm all for whatever works for you, BW.

Personally, I like the vagueness and the mystery when it comes to yoga.

As I said, I'd rather just do, and not analyze, especially given that I'm surrounded by a "Western" world I mostly decry. Yoga is one of my escapes from all that. I don't want to contaminate my yoga with Western thought.

Then too, I'm getting old and lazy. My days of intellectual gymnastics are finished, except when circumstances demand otherwise.

I used to be somewhat of a whiz at anatomy, though . . . boy was I good at memorizing the names of parts of things, where they originated and inserted, what they did, etc.
_________________
"Actually, humans died out long ago."
---Abused, abandoned hunting dog

"Things have entered a stage where the only change that is possible is for things to get worse."
---Me and my brother