BIZ MAGARITY, MBA, C-IAYT, 500 E-RYT
Editor’s Note: At the Vincera Institute, we incorporate yoga into many core rehabilitation programs. After hip or core muscle surgery, we often begin a judiciously designed set of yoga postures into the overall rehabilitation on Day 1 postoperatively. We intend for the postures to continue well past the final rehabilitation phase.
The problem with promoting our approach comes from the wise statement associated with Bikram Yoga, synthesized from traditional hatha yoga techniques: “There is yoga, and, then, there is yoga.”
The statement is so true. On researching the subject, we found way over 100 different popular disciplines. Common to all the disciplines that we researched were postures that seemed dangerous to many people’s hips. Therefore, the athletic trainers, physical therapists, and yogini at Vincera collaborated and removed the universally dangerous postures from the routines. In point of fact, certain postures are safe for certain hip morphologies and dangerous for others. So, the best-fit postures, in fact, vary from one person to another.
The bottom line is that yoga can create great benefit. On the other hand, it can also, often subtly, cause substantial harm.
I asked our super-smart, lead yoga instructor, Biz Magarity, to provide comments on yoga and the core, for both the short and long terms.
MODERN YOGA—A CONTRAST FROM THE EARLY DAYS (FIGURE 35-1)
Modern yoga looks dramatically different from its origins. It has become a booming industry since it journeyed into the West in the mid-19th century. According to the 2016 Yoga in America Study, the present-day count of 36 million US yoga practitioners represents a doubling in the past 4 years. The perception that modern yoga is primarily for young women is changing. More women (72%) continue to practice yoga, but the male proportion of practitioners is also nearly doubling. Plus, many older people are getting into it. The over-50 demographic is now only 5 percentage points behind the 30-to-49-year-old participation rate. The new segments of practitioners are contributing to the thriving niche economy, with about $16 billion dollars spent on yoga clothing, equipment, classes, and accessories just last year (Figure 35-2).1
Contrast this with the way yoga used to look. Yoga has been around since the 5th or 6th century BC (Figure 35-3). It started in pre-Vedic India and has roots in all Indian antiquity, Buddhism, Macedonia, and even China. The earliest yoga practices were mentioned in the Rigveda, which dates back to the 4th millennium BC. “Classical” yoga dates from 200 BC to the 5th century AD and Patanjali’s writings called the Yoga Sutras.2 Post-classical yoga brought a variety of different schools of yoga and a stronger focus on “unlocking” the body’s hidden potential. Early yoga was male-dominated. Since the post-classical era began, pelvic core muscles and hips have been integral parts of yoga. Physical postures developed that allowed practitioners to sit comfortably for long periods of meditation or pranayama (breath and energetic practices). Yogi (male masters) were sustained by a quest to “transcend” the physical world and enter a higher level of consciousness. Yogini (female masters) came along a lot later.
Figure 35-1.
Figure 35-2. US yoga practitioner growth 2008-2016. (Data from the 2016 Yoga in America study.1)
Figure 35-3. The elephant doing yoga in the statue represents the 5th century Hindu deity Ganesha, known as the “remover” of obstacles.
Now, we have designer yoga wear, self-proclaimed gurus on social media outlets, and gravity-defying, body-bending poses. We have “power” and “fitness” yoga. We have “hot” yoga, which usually refers to doing yoga in 100°F or so temperatures, but can apply also to hot, naked yoga. It may be easier now to find beer-tasting yoga than “enlightenment” yoga. A quick internet search shall easily reveal hundreds of different styles of yoga. One probably does not need to state that believers in ancient disciplines of yoga find themselves at odds with these American trends. Defenders of ancient ways say that yoga is now “all movement” and no “stillness.” They go on with their critique and say that modern yoga has become more of a “distraction” than an “enlightener.”
The conversations weighing the good and the bad of the modern movement have become more and more passionate within the yoga community. Blogs trigger disagreement and competition among the different schools and styles, which seems ironic considering that early yoga was all about peace and harmony. There is a yin and a yang to all this.
At least one good thing comes from all this controversy. So many varieties of yoga exist that no one discipline dominates the industry. The governing bodies of yoga cannot take sides. Therefore, would-be regulators remain loose and lenient. This leniency means that all new yoga disciplines or other new developments within the yoga world must remain “on the table”—to be accepted or rejected by anyone with access. This leniency strikes a sharp contrast with the medical world, where all new procedures, devices, or drugs must meet certain standards and pass Food and Drug Administration and/or other regulatory approvals. True regulatory agencies for yoga do not exist. Therefore, no bureaucracy can block someone from doing something new. Yoga approval remains purely a matter of popularity.
Of course, a bad side to that lack of regulation also exists.
A BLURRING DEFINITION
Defining Yoga has become super-complicated within the modern context and “noise” generated by the unregulated yoga market. “Yoga” comes from Sanskrit. Its root yuj or yoke means to unite or join, such as the harnessing of oxen. Many compound words in Sanskrit contain yoga, such as the medical term chakrayoga, which means applying a splint. In just about all modern traditions, the term yoga has come to mean “connecting” your inner self with a higher universal consciousness or spirit. Most everyone agrees that yoga involves more than just physical exercise: it has both meditative and spiritual parts.
The most recognizable component of yoga is the physical postures and practices, designed to “purify the body” and to create awareness and some level of control over the inner state. Other components of yoga include meditation, mantra, selfless service, devotion, and spiritual liberation. Less palatable in modern society, these latter pieces remain essential for a conscience-driven definition of yoga. They remain the hope to link modern yoga with science.
We still believe that advances in the physical sciences eventually unlock the profound mysteries of the obscure ancient practices. The common drive of all of those practices was, and still should be, to reverse our natural tendency to live primarily with an outward focus. By drawing our whole being inward, we will become more established within our “self,” and more able to manage our own health and well-being.
THE BENEFITS INCLUDE NEW EYES
Yoga provides the tools and practices to develop a new set of eyes. A key principle is svadyhaya, meaning self-study. You first learn the whole subject of yoga: the postures, the breathing, and the meditation exercises. Then you study yourself within that framework. How did the posture affect your performance or mood? How did the breathing affect your sleep or ability to concentrate? How did the meditation affect your energy or ability to practice new postures? Did that heightened sense of awareness during the yoga practice translate to faster reaction times on the field?
Yoga should be empowering, and allow the practitioner to heighten his/her own intuition. Then the practitioner becomes the clinician. This can be a powerful set of tools for athletes or all who consider fitness an important parameter in their lives. Athletes are, in general, a group of people likely to become what we call “disembodied” at some point in their lives, on account of lifestyle or injuries. If someone has spent his/her entire life creating a physical specimen of a body and that has become the means to success and identity, then what happens when the perfect body no longer works properly? One can play through the pain by mentally detaching oneself from that injured part of the body. How many athletes do not recognize when they are really hurt, when pain is no longer just soreness? And then someone says, “You should have addressed this earlier.” Yoga trains the awareness and intuition. The awareness and intuition muscles are the ones that tell the yoga practitioner/athlete to tell the coach, “I cannot play with this any longer.”
As has been said before in this book, the urologist, gynecologist, gastroenterologist, and orthopedist all see the pelvis as particular parts or systems. Yoga also provides a more holistic or universal set of eyes. Yoga means “union” and encompasses all those systems, particularly the musculoskeletal, hormonal, circulatory, and respiratory ones. Yoga defines a “being” in terms of multiple layers, or koshas (Figure 35-4). Three layers are the physical, mental, and energetic bodies. Within the framework of yoga we look at the physical parts, as well as the thoughts, feelings, and energy and how all those things affect the body. A woman sees the integration of these different aspects at childbirth. And childbirth happens in the pelvis, the center of the core. Medicine and yoga practitioners need study this more scientifically. We see this as a huge argument for why the core should be considered a distinct and separate specialty.
Figure 35-4. The kosha model represents a long-established yoga philosophy and a holistic approach to wellness. Postures, breathing, and meditation are the primary means of travel from the outer layers (1 to 3) into the inner layers (4 and 5), and, eventually, the inner consciousness.
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