Tag Archives: New York Times

Follow-ups to NYT article about yoga injuries

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I wanted to post links to several follow-up articles relating to my recent post The dark side of yoga about last week’s New York Times article about yoga and injuries, How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body so that if you are following this controversy through my blog, you can keep up.

Ashtanga Yoga New York posted an article, How the NYT Can Wreck Yoga. This article cites two reasons for the increase in yoga injuries: overzealousness on the part of students and the yoga industry.

The article states that too much zeal is a trait of a particular type of person “no matter what a teacher may caution.” (I just wonder if some of the people with this trait become bad yoga teachers themselves.)

The second reason is about the $5 billion per year yoga products and services industry and a value system that is based on economic incentive. The author argues that quality declines when the potential for making money is great, resulting in yoga becoming “McDonafied”. Therefore, more injuries occur because teachers and studios are more into making money than teaching quality yoga that prevents injuries.

Some good data are included, and the writer brings up injury rates in other physical activities, like basketball or football.

A balanced, serious, and accurate scientific report on the risks of yoga would have, at a minimum, explicitly stated that no one actually knows the injury rates for yoga, as is actually the case.

Click the link above to read the whole thing and all the comments.

Another article was published on Yogadork’s excellent blog. Is the New York Times Wrecking Yoga? The Community Responds includes the response mentioned above as well as a letter by Roger Cole, senior Iyengar teacher and Ph.D., to the New York Times, setting the record straight:

‘The article incorrectly states that yoga master B.K.S. Iyengar “insisted” that students practice shoulder stand in a manner that dangerously hyperflexes the neck. In fact, he insists on exactly the opposite. Mr. Broad cites a Yoga Journal column I wrote describing a method of “reducing neck bending in a shoulder stand by lifting the shoulders on a stack of folded blankets…” This safer method was invented by B.K.S. Iyengar and he has long been adamant that all of his certified teachers must teach the pose this way. Mr. Iyengar, who recently celebrated his 93rd birthday, still maintains a vigorous yoga practice that includes long holds in headstand (without support) and shoulder stand with his shoulders lifted on a prop.

The column describing Mr. Iyengar’s safer shoulder stand technique, entitled “Keep the Neck Healthy in Shoulderstand,” is at http://www.yogajournal.com/for_teachers/1091. The original version of Mr. Broad’s article supplied an incorrect link.

This is the way I was taught to do and teach shoulder stand by my teacher and trainer Eleanor Harris, as I mentioned in my previous post on this topic.

The third (so far) article was posted by Charlotte Bell on the blog of Huggermugger, a company that sells yoga supplies. In Youch! Yoga Injuries: How Not to Wreck Your Body, this 30-year yoga practitioner says matter of factly that any time you take your body out of its normal range of motion, there’s the potential for injury.

She wishes the NYT had examined modern versus traditional yoga teacher training. Me too. The traditional way has a teacher training students individually.

This is the model I chose. I was one of two students in my seven-month-long teacher training by Eleanor, who trained in the Iyengar tradition as well as other styles and who has over 20 years of experience. The other student, Kandice, and I had both been in Eleanor’s yoga classes for a good period of time before beginning her teacher training. She was aware of our practices and could address our needs individually.

The modern way of teacher training is often one-size-fits-all, for up to 40 students at a time, sometimes in a short amount of time.

Which do you think is going to produce better yoga teachers and reduced injury rates?

Bell also makes the point that yoga is not just poses:

We all know that yoga is not just poses, but asana remains the centerpiece of most Western practice. I wonder if the rise of yoga-related injuries might also be related to the fact that asana has been taken out of its original context. When the physical practice for its own sake becomes the be-all, end-all, it is much easier to become forceful and competitive, which IMO is the source of many yoga injuries. Consider how practicing the eight limbs tempers asana practice:

  • Yama:  The yamas teach us to approach practice with honesty, generosity and the spirit of non-harming.
  • Niyama:  The niyamas teach us about contentment, self-study (so that we know how poses affect us), and that our practice is not just about ourselves, that our practice is for the benefit of all beings.
  • Pranayama:  Giving our breath primacy in asana practice, as Donna Farhi teaches, shows us how to practice with the continuity of our breath in mind, so that we don’t move beyond the limits of our body’s ability to breathe freely.
  • Pratyahara:  Pratyahara teaches us to not become attached to the pleasant—or unpleasant—sensations we feel in practice.
  • Dharana:  Dharana steadies the mind so that we can see more clearly what is happening in our bodies as we practice.
  • Dhyana:  Dhyana refines our awareness of the experiences of each passing moment.
  • Samadhi:  Gives us a taste of the settling of the mind into silence—the true definition of yoga.

Well said, Charlotte Bell.

The dark side of yoga

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This article should be required reading for all yogis: How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body – NYTimes.com.

I have been lucky in that I’ve never been injured from doing yoga since I started practicing in 1982. I’ve only had muscle soreness, but never severe or lasting more than a day. Doing yoga from a book was risky, but it taught me to pay attention to my own experience.

I’ve been lucky to have had good teachers. Eleanor Harris would never have students do shoulder stand with the neck bent ninety degrees to the torso, as described in this article.

Instead, we would fold blankets and our mat to create an elevated cushioned ledge for the shoulders to rest on with the head resting on the floor a couple of inches below. Afterwards, we would rest on our backs with support under our necks. We also did prep poses before attempting sarvangasana.

Let your awareness of your body’s limits be your primary guide, and beware of any teacher who would override you.

Some people naturally have very flexible bodies. It seems that a lot of these people, to whom yoga comes easily, become yoga teachers and end up setting the bar for the rest of us.

I am fairly flexible but am unable to do lotus pose, arm balances, and several other advanced poses. I’m okay with that. I don’t feel like I have to prove anything by doing advanced poses. Still, after working toward it for an hour (or a lifetime), it is a thrill to finally do hanumanasana. I understand the desire to deepen one’s yoga practice.

I’m happy with the yoga I can do, happy to make small  increments of progress, which these days has as much to do with my own body awareness as it does with achieving an external form.

Most of my yoga studies for the past few years have been with Iyengar-certified and Anusara-inspired teachers, who tend to focus on anatomy and form.

I like how yoga keeps me flexible enough, how the poses open up my meridians so that my energy flows with more ease. I simply feel better during my off-mat life because of yoga, and if the day ever comes that I don’t, that’s the day I stop doing it.

Besides reading this article, I also recommend that yoga students and teachers watch the video Anatomy for Yoga with Paul Grilley, which clearly shows the range of flexibility in the bodies of yogis. It will make you feel better if you can’t get your arms straight in wheel pose.

An excerpt is available on YouTube:

Go Easy on Yourself, a New Wave of Research Urges – NYTimes.com

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Go Easy on Yourself, a New Wave of Research Urges – NYTimes.com.

I love this new research about self-compassion. Our culture often gives us the message that we need to be tough and disciplined with ourselves, yet many aspects of our culture are not very healthy, from obesity, diabetes, and the standard American diet (SAD) to politics, greed, and the environment.

How can we as individuals change this? How do we get healthier? You can start with yourself.

A cutting edge of psychological research shows that giving yourself a break may move you toward better health instead of away from it.

Kristin Neff’s book, Self-Compassion: Stop Beating Yourself Up and Leave Insecurity Behind, is on my to-read list.

People who score high on tests of self-compassion have less depression and anxiety, and tend to be happier and more optimistic. Preliminary data suggest that self-compassion can even influence how much we eat and may help some people lose weight.

Dr. Neff, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, distinguishes between self-compassion and self-indulgence. A key question is whether you treat yourself as well as you treat the people you care about. Would you tell your child or best friend what you tell yourself when you are struggling?

Also, having compassion for your own suffering does not mean that nothing needs to be done. You can take a moment to feel what you’re feeling, have compassion for yourself, and then consider what you can do to make it better.

This is one of the reasons I like doing and teaching the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) using the method I learned from Dene Ballantine.

  1. You accept your own not-so-great emotional experience with compassion.
  2. You bring your focus into the present and onto yourself, without judgment, by forgiving yourself and others. You let go of the story.
  3. You create a direction for movement toward a more pleasant emotional experience.

A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs | NYTimes.com

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A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs – NYTimes.com.

Moving story about Steve told by someone who met him as an adult and was close to him the rest of his life, Mona Simpson, his sister, who’s a novelist.

This is a great character sketch of someone mainly presented to us through the media. Fascinating individual.

Prescriptions and modern medicine

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I was just reading an article in the New York Times about the effects of exercise on depression, and this sentence caught my eye:

His investigation joins a growing movement among some physiologists and doctors to consider and study exercise as a formal medicine, with patients given a prescription and their progress monitored, as it would be if they were prescribed a pill.

Hallelujah. I am so glad to hear that the medical profession is broadening what it prescribes.

The word prescribe comes from the Latin pre (before) + scribere (to write). It basically means to direct in writing.

Somehow we’ve come to interpret the word prescription as synonymous with pharmaceutical drug. Glad to know it ain’t necessarily so.

Gee, before you know it, doctors may be prescribing not just exercise, but also massage, diet, and rest, changes that have improved health for millenia without corporate profit.

What a concept.

Oh, exercise was found to be helpful for depression.

Graphic showing why prolonged sitting is unhealthy

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Here’s a graphic showing the health risks of prolonged sitting, which I’ve blogged about before:

Besides the reasons shown here and described in the NY Times article link, here are a couple of more reasons why prolonged sitting creates dis-ease and why movement is good for you:

  1. The lymphatic system aids the immune system in destroying pathogens and filtering waste, and it delivers nutrients, oxygen, and hormones to the cells. It has no central pump, like the circulatory system. Instead, the lymphatic system depends on muscular movement, breathing, and gravity to move lymph throughout the body. Frequent movement is critical to move lymph. 
  2. Walking moves the sacrum, which acts as a pump for cerebro-spinal fluid, the fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. Cerebro-spinal fluid nourishes, removes toxins, and cushions the brain and spinal cord. 

Next, tips if you have a job that requires sitting.

Tattoo art on yogis

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Loved this NY Times photo piece on tattoos on yogis.

I have a little tattoo on my belly: OM. How about you? Do you have a yoga tattoo?

 

New mind-body research finding; living in a toxic world

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I came across this New York Times article, Rejection May Hurt More than Feelings.

The study found that an unwanted breakup affects the brain the same way as having hot coffee spilled on your skin.

In other words, emotional pain is like, or the same as, physical pain.

Also, the New York Times Sunday Book Review features a review, Making Sense of a Toxic World, of a new book, What’s Gotten Into Us?: Staying Healthy in a Toxic World, that looks at the difficulty of proving there’s a clear cause-and-effect of our chemical-laden bodies with rising rates of autoimmune disease, some cancers, autism, reproductive problems, and so on.

It’s not a rave review by any means, but it does have this to say:

The more interesting parts here concern the chemical industry and the free rein it’s had to market scores of thousands of underscrutinized compounds. But it isn’t just chemicals that have gotten into us, Jenkins astutely notes: it’s also culture. “We are saturated with products, and marketing, and advertising,” he writes. “Our ignorance is not an accident.” Manufacturers fight labeling laws, and the federal government doesn’t adequately support independent research into the environmental and health impacts of even the most commonly used chemicals. Regulatory agencies are underfunded and understaffed, even as consumption of manufactured goods (and goods imported from countries with even less regulation than ours) continues to rise.

The reviewer concludes:

… it’s a fine, user-friendly introduction to avoiding environmental hazards in the home, and an even better catalyst to questioning how we got to this point and transcending our unthinking reliance on chemicals that — at certain levels, in certain circumstances, at certain times in our lives — definitely do more harm than good.

Serotonin: the “don’t panic yet” neurotransmitter

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Here’s a New York Times article, Job Description Grows for Our Utility Hormone, on the neurotransmitter serotonin.

New findings: it’s manufactured prenatally by the placenta and stimulates the growth of new neural connections in the forebrain, and it plays a role in bone health.

Excerpts:

The molecule was first detected in 1948, in blood serum, and it was shown be a vascular toning agent that causes blood vessels to constrict — hence its name, a conjoinment of “serum” and “tone.” Five years later, scientists found serotonin in brain extracts as well, and they soon learned that the recently invented hallucinogenic drug lysergic acid diethylamide worked by tapping into the brain’s serotonin system and that if you took too much LSD you might end up wearing hair garlands and overusing the word “wow.”

For all the intricacy, serotonin in the brain has a basic personality. “It’s a molecule involved in helping people cope with adversity, to not lose it, to keep going and try to sort everything out,” said Philip J. Cowen, a serotonin expert at Oxford University and the Medical Research Council. In the fine phrase of his Manchester University colleague Bill Deakin, “it’s the ‘Don’t panic yet’ neurotransmitter,” said Dr. Cowen.
Given serotonin’s job description, disturbances in the system can contribute to depression, anxiety, panic attacks and mental calcification, an inability to see the world anew — at least in otherwise vulnerable people.

Neuronal serotonin may be better known, but as it happens the vast bulk of the body’s serotonin supply, better than 95 percent, is synthesized outside the brain, mostly by the gut. The two serotonin stocks are kept strictly segregated by the blood-brain barrier, however, and are able to perform on entirely independent pathways.

Repost from NY Times: Is Sitting a Lethal Activity?

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A new field in health research is called “inactivity studies,” and this article reports on its findings.

Here’s one. Two people eat and exercise the same. One gains weight, the other doesn’t. Why?

If you fidget more and move more, but not necessarily work out, you can burn a lot of calories. People who are more sedentary put on more weight.

That seems like a no-brainer, but so much knowledge about this is based on self-reporting, which is simply unreliable. The study used “magic underwear” to track motion.

This is your body on chairs: Electrical activity in the muscles drops — “the muscles go as silent as those of a dead horse,” Hamilton says — leading to a cascade of harmful metabolic effects. Your calorie-burning rate immediately plunges to about one per minute, a third of what it would be if you got up and walked. Insulin effectiveness drops within a single day, and the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes rises. So does the risk of being obese. The enzymes responsible for breaking down lipids and triglycerides — for “vacuuming up fat out of the bloodstream,” as Hamilton puts it — plunge, which in turn causes the levels of good (HDL) cholesterol to fall.

I’m curious. How much sitting is too much? More than six hours a day, some say; others say more than nine hours a day. Sitting is more lethal than age, sex, education, smoking, hypertension, BMI and other indicators.

And did you know that Steelcase, maker of file cabinets and office furniture, now makes treadmill desks?

That’s the ticket for health at sedentary jobs. That, or fidget and get up and walk around a lot.

“Go into cubeland in a tightly controlled corporate environment and you immediately sense that there is a malaise about being tied behind a computer screen seated all day,” he said. “The soul of the nation is sapped, and now it’s time for the soul of the nation to rise.”

Is Sitting a Lethal Activity? – NYTimes.com.