Whoa, Rethinking Yoga!

Been looking up Joseph Encinia, the yoga champion whose video I saw.

His life story is pretty amazing. He was diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis as a child and lived with constant pain. He had a heart attack at the age of 13, probably from all the medications he had been on to control that pain.

And then he found yoga.

(The link to this video.)

Awesome.

Maybe I need to be more open-minded about the incense and the "Namaste" thing. :o)

My Impressions of Yoga

I like yoga.

I think … until about three-quarters through the class … when I’m once again peering, upside down, from between my legs, the sweat dripping down my face …

And I’m not even doing “hot yoga,” when the room’s kept at 100+ degrees.

One thing’s for sure: it’s not your mother’s yoga. Back in the ‘70s, I recall yoga being gentle stretching, then lying around.

These days, my doctor husband says his fittest patients say they do yoga.

I'm surprised to find that people compete at yoga, like this man, the 2012 world champion:

(Here's the link to this video.)

Incidentally, me doing yoga looks nothing like this.

I tried to read about yoga, but even the Wikipedia summary made my eyes cross.

This dust-up, about whether the physical practice of yoga started out as a sex cult or not, was mildly interesting.

For me, yoga is exercise that has been carefully staged to be enjoyable.

When they direct you to pay attention to your breath, it does distract you from your screaming thighs.

And I am proud of my new ability to stand on one foot without falling over immediately.

I like the aesthetics, too: the outfits, the gear, even the yoga-mat “sling” you use to carry your rolled-up mat over your shoulder like some folklore hero wandering into the village.

I like my instructors’ playlists.

I like my instructors, all beautiful and impossibly limber.

I like the names of the poses – warrior, dancer, happy baby, eagle, tree.

I even like the “Om” part. Sounds cool.

The incense I could do without.

Also, the lingo, where we all pretend to know another language, like speaking Klingon or ordering at Starbuck’s.

I’m not going to say “Nameste,” especially not while putting my praying hands up to my supposed “third eye,” I’m just not.

Couch-Potato Kids

Let’s face it: most of us have couch-potato kids.

According to the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition, 2 out of 3 kids are not physically active and spend an average of 7 ½ hours per day with screens.

According to the CDC, over 21% of teenagers are obese.

According to an ESPN article, only 30% of girls and 37% of boys play a sport in high school, and by senior year, only 1 out of 4 are physically active.

My son’s an avid computer gamer. We used to refer to the daily chore of getting him out of his room as “airing him out.”

And like many high-school kids (see the stats, above), he felt intimidated by the idea of “going out for” a sport.

Yet, he found one: swimming.

It’s made a world of difference. He looks better, stands taller, moves better, sleeps and eats better, gets better grades, is happier.

How’d we do it? It was about 95% luck. But we did learn a few things:

1.      It might take many attempts before you find something that clicks. With our kids, we tried gymnastics, soccer, tae kwon do, fencing, football, rugby, hiking, biking and swimming.

2.      The one that clicks could surprise you. I’d have never guessed swimming and rugby (my daughter’s sport).

3.      I thought my husband was being a hard-ass when he kept after the kids to move every day. But if only so they didn’t end up at the gym with Mom or on a bike ride with Dad (the horror), they began seriously considering their options.

4.      The best sports are new (rugby, fencing) and/or underdog ones.

5.      And really, the sport doesn’t matter. It’s the coach. If your kids find a warm, supportive coach, they’ve just won big-time.