yoga

Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses

gwen — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 08:00:00 +0000

I’ve always wondered what prompts people to write memoirs. It’s one thing to be a celebrity riding the wave of success, but quite another to be a regular Jane baring it all for the judgment of strangers. As a critic for publications as prestigious as The New York Times, Claire Dederer is no stranger to criticism; nor does she seem to fear it. In her first book, Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses, she bravely opens the cloak of privacy to reveal herself to the world. I suppose she is a writer who was ready to tell her own story for once, as opposed to reviewing those of others. Full of sincerity and love, this book is a cleverly written homage to her family, her friends, her marriage, and of course, her yoga.

Those of you turned off by “yoga” in the title should reconsider, as this is nothing like the New Age self-indulgence that has given the ancient tradition a bad reputation. Instead, Dederer loosely ties her yoga practice to the peaks and valleys of her life. In each chapter she recalls anecdotes and tells them in the context of a different yoga pose. This structural device offers comic relief and surprising tangents like this: “Back in college, we used to have a silly rubric: Never have sex with anyone who doesn’t like Van Morrison…based on the fact that [he] is embarrassing, and sex is embarrassing.” Then onto the next paragraph: “And Lion was embarrassing. It made you feel like Van Morrison, all uncontrollable noises and strange eruptions.” These are also moments for the reader to self-reflect, and this is where her writing is most profound and relatable.

Apart from being an extremely talented writer, she is a poster child for the ultimate alternative generation. In typical Northwest grunge fashion, Dederer is admirably cool without trying. Her book is packed with dry wit, self-deprecation, and cultural references that I only understand because of my older, Gen-X sister. After enough time self-reflecting in Seattle, a city known for its constant self-perfecting, Dederer and her husband move to the mountains of Boulder. This is when she dives into the implications of her childhood, the fine line between selfishness and personal happiness, and the pros and cons of moving back home.

These universal and common issues make for a fascinating memoir that only a serious writer could pull off successfully. From beginning to end, this book carries the mantra that life can be as bizarre as putting your feet behind your head, and also as rewarding. Paraphrasing Patanjali in one of his Yoga Sutras: Yoga becomes firmly grounded when it is practiced for a long time, without a break, and with sincere devotion. I’d say that’s true of most good things in life, and why Dederer would choose yoga as the unifying theme for a book as dear to her heart as this. At one point she reflects, “What happens when a generation of children grows up with all these comings and goings; when a generation of children grows up with parents who want to be free, and who think that freedom is movement?” Well, Claire Dederer has personally shown us just exactly what happens, and why she chose to dig her heels in and never give up on her practice.

We sometimes duplicate a review. Click here for another writer's take on _Poser.

Written by: Katy Pine, February 23rd 2011

Tales from the Yoga Studio

mandy — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 20:00:00 +0000

By Rain Mitchell

Plume

Tales from the Yoga Studio is, in many ways, the typical story of White women who discover Eastern philosophy (in this case, yoga) and learn how to breathe deeply. Though the women weren’t all from White, upper class society (there was a token Latina and some women who couldn’t afford the yoga class), it essentially contains the trials and tribulations of upper class Angelenos: Which yoga studio to go to today? What to wear to yoga class?

I have had experience attending a wide variety of yoga classes and peeking into the world in which yoga is a competitive sport. I dislike the commodification of yoga, which has become, in this context, devoid of the union of body and mind. In spite of this, I was looking forward to reading a potentially fun drama about a yoga studio.

While there were a few lines that I almost marked to look at later, for the most part I was annoyed with the characters, found the writing lacking a strong voice, and felt slightly impatient to finish the 297 pages. I continued as a result of a sense of wonder that there might be a hidden point that would illuminate itself in the last few pages and make everything seem worthwhile. No such luck.

It could be that, as a woman of color recently returning to the United States from India, the characters of Tales from the Yoga Studio were too preoccupied with their own world. For this reason, I am explicitly exposing my potential bias. There may very well be people out there who would enjoy this novel precisely because of its simplicity. In retrospect, perhaps my expectations were too high.

Tales from the Yoga Studio was clearly not my favorite novel, but for someone who does yoga in LA, may be right up your alley.

Written by: Lakshmi Saracino, January 20th 2011

Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses

farhana — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 12:00:00 +0000

By Claire Dederer

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

In Poser, Claire Dederer takes on two of the most en vogue trends for young women in the early twenty-first century: yoga and attachment parenting. After a liberated childhood, having been raised in Seattle in the 1970s and 1980s by parents who embraced many of the hippie ideals of the 1960s, Dederer took those lessons of freedom to heart. She, like many others in her generation, went to college but delayed getting a 9-5 job, marriage, and childrearing into her third decade.

Having settled down, she quickly found herself closer to the 1950s, with a husband who was the sole breadwinner except for the emphasis on organic food and co-sleeping and public breastfeeding. Thanks to a back problem and subtle social pressure from her fellow Supermoms, Claire decided to try yoga.

The book is cleverly divided into chapters based on yoga poses that the author was mastering. Throughout her struggle with balance and strength and patience in the yoga studio, the reader follows Dederer as these trials and successes translate into the rest of her life. Without sounding trite or cliché, she manages to draw the reader in to the lessons she is learning about being present in her life in every moment without worrying about perfection—admittedly a difficult concept for someone who grew up being told over and over again that she could, and should, be anything she wanted.

The cast of characters includes two children, Claire’s overworked and underpaid husband, and an assortment of immediate family members who are never more than a stone’s throw away. Each of these relationships shifts ever so slightly as the author becomes more comfortable with her own discomfort, both in various yoga studios and in her everyday life.

Many mothers will immediately identify with her visceral need to measure up to the other mothers in her circle and be perfect and her message comes across in a refreshingly humorous but not self-deprecating way. Whether or not you engage in a yoga practice, there are lessons to be learned from this book.

Written by: Kari O’Driscoll, December 7th 2010

The Subtle Body: The Story of Yoga in America

admin — Sun, 30 May 2010 19:10:00 +0000

By Stefanie Syman

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

If you assume, as I did, that yoga came to the United States via the Maharishi in the 1970s, you’ll be surprised again and again as you read Stefanie Syman’s The Subtle Body. This intensively researched history reveals an unexpected American familiarity with yoga as early as the late eighteenth century, and a steady underground pursuit of yoga’s fundamental nature that burst into a national obsession in the past decade.

The Transcendentalists may be credited with bringing interest in the Eastern philosophies to polite Western society. It cannot be said, however, that Emerson and friends had a firm grasp on what yoga was or, for that matter, any interest in the discipline. Nevertheless, the study of The Bhagavad Gita led to a slow blossoming of yogic practices, and by the late nineteenth century, yoga was a key component of a spiritual retreat in Maine. It was there that Swami Vivekananda instructed his flock of mostly female followers in the practice of yoga, even delving into “Kundaline” and meditation. The part of the general public that was aware of the goings-on viewed the whole situation with a suspicious eye. Was it quackery or pagan religion? The same question issues from a large portion of the population to this day.

Though not a focus of Syman’s book, it is interesting to note that women were (and remain) the bulk of yogic followers and supporters. From the conversion of Woodrow Wilson’s daughter to Garbo and Swanson, women flocked to yoga and Hinduism, either in search of spiritual enlightenment or weight loss and beauty.

The Subtle Body is a hearty volume, better suited for the serious student of yoga than for the dilettante. Syman balances her research with profound characterization of the key players and delivers an exceptionally fast-paced but thorough history of Eastern spiritual and physical paths as they blended into and assimilated Western culture.

Written by: Deborah Adams, May 30th 2010

Hamsa Clothing Yoga Pants

admin — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 08:41:00 +0000

By Hamsa Clothing

Hamsa is a Sanskrit word for a meditation we all do daily without intention; it is our first, and inherent, pranayama: inhale (ham) and exhale (sa). Breathing is a natural way to steady the mind and calm the body. It provides a method to refocus one's physical and mental rhythm, and channel it in a more positive, stress-free way. Because of this, pranayama is an integral part of yoga.

As one might expect given the name, Hamsa Clothing is a woman-run company that facilitates yogic comfort through the sale of cotton pants and tees made to stretch (thanks lycra!) with the body—particularly the female body—during one's yoga practice. Its sister company, Moonseats, sells meditation cushions. Run by Sangeeta from Cape Town, South Africa, Hamsa Clothing is an alternative to the corporatism and competition that has infected the world of yoga.

Sangeeta provided me with three sample pair of pants for this review, each a different design and color. The first were rather small for my size 12 lower half, and when worn resemble a pair of calf-length leggings. (It's possible these would be ankle length on someone who isn't six feet tall, like I am.) In fact, I can easily see these having a dual use if paired with a cute top instead of a tee. The deep red material is spiced up a bit by a multi-colored floral design that I simply adore: a sort of modern, fashionable take on Hawaiian print. I also love the soft stretchiness of the fabric, and its breathability while hugging the body.

Pairs two and three appear to be made of a different material than the first, a heavier and thicker cotton—though no less soft and stretchy—that would work well for winter sessions. The medium size fit me just fine, though to be honest, a large may well have fit better. Both pair have a reinforced roll top waist, which allows you to adjust the waistline in order to achieve a more snug fit and create the most flattering and stylish look for your particular body type. The roll top also makes these pants suitable for ladies with a bun in the oven (or on a badly bloated period day) since they will expand as your belly expands.

What makes the second and third pair distinct from each other is both the color (one is periwinkle blue while the other is steel gray, both of which are very pleasing and calming) and the shape of the leg. The blue pair is a standard pant style: semi-loose yet fitted at the thigh and slightly flared (more like boot cut) at the ankle. The gray pair, however, is a bit more adventurous and reminds me of something I see the hippie tourists wearing around Kolkata: a harem-style cut that is baggy throughout the length of the leg with a tightly bunched cuff at the ankle. My recent readings of the Indian editions of both Marie Claire and Vogue have confirmed that this style is coming back into popular fashion, so perhaps this means I am now ahead of the curve. The construction on all three pair of pants is impeccable.

Hamsa does have another Sanskrit meaning, one that is no doubt the actual root of this clothing company's name. Hamsa is typically translated as swan, a term that is a slight misnomer since swans aren't indigenous to India and the creature called hamsa was probably actually a goose. Somewhere along the way the linguistic swap was made when hamsa became associated (through repetition) with the inverse of the word, soaham, meaning "that which I am." Because when asked to self-define, we'd probably all rather be swans than geese, no?

Written by: Mandy Van Deven, January 6th 2010

Red Bamboo Tank

admin — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:36:00 +0000

By Dear Lil Devas

Cotton is a quandary. To me, no fabric is more comfortable, but its environmental impact is vast. Cotton is sprayed with reservoirs of pesticides, dumping tanks of volatile organic compounds onto the soil. The wide spacing necessary to cultivate cottons also diminishes soil fertility. Also, if you use cotton, odds are that you are exploiting a child in Uzbekistan. Is there anyway to avoid culpability?

Synthetics make me feel like I'm wrapped in plastic. Bamboo, on the other hand, takes in five times the volume of greenhouse gasses as an equivalent stand of timber trees and releases thirty-five percent more oxygen. Bamboo does not require replanting or fertilization, and its roots provide an infrastructure that help prevent erosion.

Fortunately, bamboo-material clothing is becoming more available. The labor conditions of the workers who produce it may be compromised, but at least it's creating less damage at the ground level. Dear Lil Devas purchases material from factories from who meet Oeko-Tex and ISO 14001 standards, the highest international standards for protection of workers and the environment. They offer splendid high-coverage tanks in a full spectrum of shades—white, natural, baby pink, light blue, red, cobalt, green, brown, and black—made from lightweight bamboo fabric. The fabric is reported to have hypoallergenic and antibacterial and antifungal properties, and the top is designed with a lined bust and a length that keeps the belly covered when executing the Tree, Triangle, or Cobra. Their pants and bags are manufactured locally. Pants are available in two styles and five colors. Now, if I can achieve something more than the lotus position. Tadakasana, I can also handle. Time to go practice.

Photo depicts Dear Lil Devas bamboo tank in brown.

Written by: Erika Mikkalo, September 8th 2009

The Inner Peace Diet: Attain Permanent Weight Loss and Pure Bliss in Just 7 weeks

admin — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 00:15:00 +0000

By Aileen McCabe-Maucher, Hugo Maucher

Alpha Books

I’m sixty-three years old and believe me when I say that throughout my lifetime I have tried just about every diet out there. I guess I have been obsessed about my weight forever…well, at least since menopause made it almost impossible to lose a pound! I’ve always considered myself part of the “new age” crowd ever since the '60s. So The Inner Peace Diet piqued my interest.

I soon discovered that The Inner Peace Diet is not your normal diet book. Written by a professional chef and a registered nurse who is also a social worker, the book is centered on the chakra system, and is written to bring your energy and life in balance. If you aren’t an expert on chakras, there is no need to worry. This book will explain everything that you need to know to take part in the seven-week weight loss plan. Each week of the diet centers around one of the seven chakras.

The plan is designed to focus on body, mind, and soul. Each chapter contains recipes, guided meditations, and exercises to help you attain inner peace and remove stress from your life, in addition to losing weight. I found a lot of the yoga postures to be slightly difficult for someone my age, but a younger person could really get into this program. (I have always felt that it is up to the individual to personalize any weight loss program to their own lifestyle and needs.)

The meals are easy to make and are not your ordinary fare: baked eggs Florentine casserole, pear yogurt bread, teriyaki fettuccine with watercress, and even healthy banana s’mores. So, I suggest that you read The Inner Peace Diet if you are looking for a diet that considers not only your body, but also your mind and your spirit. You can lose weight and get your life in balance!

Written by: Paula M. Ezop, March 20th 2009

Hip Tranquil Chick: A Guide to Life On and Off the Yoga Mat

admin — Mon, 14 May 2007 13:27:00 +0000

By Kimberly Wilson

Inner Ocean Press

I don’t know about you, but for me, being a girl today is hard work. The stress of relationships, working, trying to stay healthy, managing a meager financial budget and just trying to figure out what to do with the rest of your life is strenuous and draining work for the body, mind and spirit. Luckily, Kimberly Wilson’s Hip Tranquil Chick is the modern girl’s guide to feeling strong, chic and ready to take on the world.

In this book, Wilson breaks down the philosophy of yoga and how it can be applied to enrich your everyday life—on and off the mat. On the mat, Wilson provides basic poses and sequences, such as “Healing Hip Openers” and “Energizing Sun Salutes,” that help you find strength and tranquility. Off the mat, Wilson lays out strategies to help you find your personal style, find your dream job, create positive energy at home and work, manage your money sensibly and nurture your social consciousness. Through the colorful illustrations, creative tips and specific tasks, Wilson provides the tools for you to find your inner “hip tranquil chick;” they will give you the power to transform concepts into action. After reading this book, you will realize that the basic principles of yoga offer you not only a plethora of physical benefits, but also a way of life. Wilson provides the modern girl with the ability to envision her future and help her take tangible steps (with excellent posture) towards achieving those goals.

This book is a must read for any modern girl looking for some perspective in this chaotic world, but please, take this one suggestion… read it slowly. With its wealth of information, this book can be slightly overwhelming. Wilson’s “hip tranquil chick” needs to find her personal style, create an awesome feng-shui room and, perhaps, even save the world. These things cannot be achieved after one quick read of this book. No, this book deserves to be read slowly. Soak in its richness. Take the time to seriously consider and understand every “tranquil tip,” “OMwork” assignment and inspirational quote. Take the time to master each chapter and section. Slowly follow the beautiful path that any girl, from the novice to the most experienced “yogini,” can follow in order to find and exude her “inner hip tranquil chick.” Namaste.

Note: If you want more Kimberly Wilson, check out her blog. There are some pretty interesting podcasts you should check out where she interviews other women doing great work. There is also information on book signings, retreats, and how to throw your own “hip tranquil chick” soirée.

Written by: Lisa Norton, May 14th 2007

Ascent: Yoga for an Inspired Life (Winter 2006)

admin — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 15:46:00 +0000

Timeless Books

I am a lazy yoga practitioner: I go to class infrequently, never practice independently, and try but rarely manage to apply the principles of bliss, contentment, and internal focus to my hustle-bustle, hurry-scurry life.

Reading Ascent, a quarterly yoga magazine published in Montreal, has motivated me to be a little more yogic in the new year. Ascent is a beautifully-crafted glossy magazine. The Winter 2006 issue focuses on the theme of bliss which is explored in photo essays, exegeses by various swamis, and even a Peanuts comic, The Gita, in which Snoopy tells Linus “Even those who do not understand, but try what they hear and worship with faith, can transcend death, too.”

Ascent won the 2005 Utne Independent Press Award for Best Spiritual Coverage, but the strongest sections of the magazine are those which are focused on story and not spirit. The meditations by swamis are a bit tepid on whole, and I was quickly bored with the essay on Rumi’s mystical poetry because it fails to analyze the form or content of the poetry and instead riffs on divine tangents which, in my mind, are too esoteric and not based on the material fact of Rumi’s work.

The strongest sections of the magazine are the personal essays and non-fiction accounts, which include an essay on Bhutan, and a lovely essay about finding bliss while working in a bookshop. There is also a finely written, empathetic yet critical account by Hilary Keever about a drug rehab center/commune in Italy.

Yes, if you are at all interested in Eastern philosophy and yogic values, subscribe to Ascent. Maybe if you are more enlightened than I am, you won’t be as tempted to roll your eyes and can fully enjoy this well-edited and unique magazine.

Written by: Rachel McCrystal, January 15th 2007