Dear Yogis
You may have heard the phrase ‘sitting is the new smoking’. People tell us with authority that our hunter-gather ancestors used the body as it was supposed to be used with constant activity, with proper, minimal use of stress and proper time spent resting and digesting.
A dear yogi friend gave me a book: Move Your DNA, Restore Your Health Through Natural Movement by Katy Bowman. She says we can hypothesize on the movement of the ancient tribes based on existing evidence. It demonstrates why we are ill-at-ease in our bodies today.
As a baby, you would have been exercised many times a day and walking and squatting long before the modern toddler. ‘When not play-gathering, you played in constantly varying terrain. This all-day movement... developed the skills, strength, and shape you would eventually need in order to function as an adult, and your gait and walking patterns were much less toddler-like and wobbly because you didn’t wear diapers. Your pelvis and hips took the shape necessary to continue squatting, sitting on the floor, and walking a ton, and were not influenced by... continuous time in a single position. Adults (from fourteen-years-old) walked 3-to-10 miles a day, harvested and carried load, all maximising bone density.
Katy Bowman says the way we move now is so drastically different from our ancestors that even an hour-or-so in the gym, many, many times a week, adds up to almost nothing compared to what the muscles, tissue, fascia and cells were designed for. She asks: ‘For how many hours a week is a chair pressing against your hamstrings? How does this constant pressure affect the blood vessels running down to your feet or the nerves in the pelvis? Have your body’s tissues atrophied to the point that they are no longer able to adapt?
Sitting isn’t the new smoking. It’s the original smoking.
Training
If you haven’t tried Mysore before, consider coming tomorrow, Saturday, to Triyoga Ealing anytime after 7.00. The class finishes at 10.00. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t memorised the sequence yet, Zephyr will help. Newcomers to this system come at 9.00 and people who know the routine come earlier. Think about it; why wouldn’t you get up early on a weekend morning, walk through the cold, wet streets to yoga, spend 90 minutes on your mat and celebrate with a bowl of free gruel afterwards! What fun!
I felt so particularly overjoyed after the classes yesterday: the yoga, the atmosphere, the chatting and joshing, the newcomers, the oldcomers, the effort, the groaning, the older yogis, the foetus, the corpse poses at the end... I’d be lost without you. Book through this website here.
Yoga in the News
This is interesting... NPR has: How 'Namaste' Flew Away From Us. Apparently the use of the word in the US makes US South Asians crazy. The writer explains: “The first part of Namaste, "namaha," means "to bend" or "salutations" or "greetings." The "te" in namaste means "to you." All it means is “hello”. But 'it makes our skin crawl, our face burn and our heart do weird things’ when Western Europeans and North Americans use the word! Who knew!
The Sunday Times has a book review: The Story of Yoga by Alistair Shearer. “Even beyond the baddies, yoga’s journey West gives Shearer a compelling cast of characters. Its proponents included... Mollie Stack, who, living in India before the outbreak of the First World War, noticed that the local women had superior posture to their colonial counterparts. Stack taught a version of yoga when she returned to London and created the Women’s League.”
Enjoy your weekend... if you've done your taxes!
