Yoga

Meditating on the Yoga Journal Conference

The Yoga Journal Conference was coming to New York, and as a long-time practitioner and teacher, I thought it was time to check in with the scene and see how American yoga has evolved.  I set my alarm for 5:30 a.m., and from the high-flying F train, saw dawn over Brooklyn.

Arriving at the midtown Hilton welcome desk at 7 a.m., I greeted one of my yoga students, a volunteer registering us sleepy mendicants with props slung over our shoulders.  I had signed up for six yoga classes in two days.  I wondered:  Will everyone there be 23, in Lycra, popping into handstands in the middle of the room?

My first 8 a.m. workshop with Dana Flynn allayed those fears.  “Do whatever the fuck you want!” she cried.  Ah, my kind of gal.  Funky music played for us in Radical Movement for Yogis:  Unleash the Teacher Within.  The feisty, decoratively tattooed Dana — creator of Laughing Lotus — gathered us for her introductory talk.  “How many here are teachers?”  Hands went up.  Then she asked, “What about maintaining your own practice?  Do you wait until you’ve finished your list of administrative chores, or do you make sure to take care of yourself?”  Got my number!  “Do your own practice, first thing!  Go deep down inside.”  Dana had us dancing through a rhythmic flow of challenging poses.  Exhilarated, I relished her exuberant hug.  This is what I’ve come for:  inspiration, refreshment, an infusion of wisdom.

In the next workshop, the elegant Elena Brower suggested we let the negativity go and release our blame and shame.  How often class lectures are addressed to some mood I’m not in.  Knowing Elena to be a much-loved teacher, I wondered about the strictures of leading conference classes.  As I sat on the floor lengthening over my tired right leg with my left bent in janu sirsasana, an assistant came over to push that bent knee down further.  “No!”  I said, popping up.  After many miles of running, high-impact African dance classes, and years of teaching aerobics, my knees have survived, just.  They will descend on their own, thank you.  Startled, she breathed a nervous apology.

So many stretches for my already over-stretched hamstrings!  Now into my fourth hour of class, I gave up to lie on my back with knees bent.  Elena came over sweetly to inquire, and I whispered: “I can’t stretch my hamstrings any more!”  With a sympathetic nod, she leaned her body into my bent legs, her weight gently sending my thighbones into my hip joints.  I sighed with relief and gratitude.

Gliding up the escalator and along the corridors, with all shapes and sizes and ages, I wondered, “Where are the guys?”  Among the mat carriers, I’d seen hundreds of women, two people of color and barely a handful of men.  Just past the hastily printed “Women” sign taped to the restroom door was poignant evidence of male absence.  Waiting on the inevitable line, I peeked behind the tasteful blue curtain hung along one wall to see, in the shadows, a line of urinals, standing like loyal sentries awaiting their next patrol.

Done at 12:30 with my next class at 3:30, I could see that the schedule was geared for ample time to recover, lunch and shop.  I passed through the Marketplace portals to observe the profusion of products and services that have sprouted like weeds around the ancient practice of yoga.  There were videos, jewelry, togs and colorful variants on the ubiquitous yoga mat.

“Americans spend $5.7 billion a year on yoga classes and products, including equipment, clothing, vacations and media (DVDs, videos, books and magazines),” says the Yoga Journal page inviting sponsors to do their bit for attendees.  “Place your products and services directly in the hands of your best prospects: affluent, health-conscious consumers.”  And so they have.  Everywhere was someone’s brainchild responding to the trend, iPads poised to snag your precious email address.  Here were 50-buck gel discs to cushion tender knees and hands; there were frozen stevia-sweetened coconut bars.  I chatted with the sparkly reps offering to make my instructional video.  Just inside the entrance was the ultimate shrine to yoga status:  white paper background unrolled with a smiling Yoga Journal photog to fulfill your fantasy of being cover girl or boy.  Enthusiasts volunteered their most acrobatic pose.

I had brought a change of clothes, anticipating some evening activity — a panel, a kirtan, a party, but no.  I was free to stagger home and sink into a hot bath.  Before collapsing into slumber, I unpacked my gift bag containing a product for every bodily system:  GitOn for my gut, Omegas for my heart, Arnica to heal my bruises, ginseng for my adrenals, melatonin for my sleep, Tea Tree gum for my teeth, antiseptic cream for my skin, Ester-C to buck up my immune system and accelerate my metabolism, fish oil for memory and mood, blueberry pomegranate balm for my lips, a supplement of turmeric, ginger, cayenne and, for my joints, willow bark — hey, isn’t that aspirin? — a Luna bar and coconut milk for a peckish interlude and CleanseMORE for the reluctant digestion that might follow.  The notoriously challenging Jivamukti studio distributed free China-Gel for the relief of six different kinds of pain. There was cleansing renewal for my mat, Yogini Cleanies botanically-based body wipes for my sweat (lavender to Zen you out, lemongrass to Zen you up!) and a gold coin from Abacus Wealth Partners, looking suspiciously like Chanukah gelt.  Maybe all the spirit is in the accessories.

Eight a.m. on Sunday, I got my first look at the legendary Ana Forrest, known for her athletic, challenging style.  Oy, I thought, I’m already zonked.  How will I survive?

Out strode this Texas macha wearing weightlifting gloves, exuding the stored kinesis of a jungle cat.  “Let’s practice!”  Striding around the room, crying out encouragement and flinging her dark waist-length braid with a dramatic flick of the head, Ana was female ferocity made magical.  The work deeply warmed my muscles, some moves like physical therapy exercises on a foundation of standing poses.  I’m plenty bendy and a little too free in the joints, so the harder we worked, the better I felt. As Ana’s muscled assistants toured the room to help us into arm balances, my fibers screaming for a rest, she counseled, “Stay with it!”  Sending us beyond the familiarity of routine, this kind of pain was not the sharp shock of injury, but the weird, burning discomfort of challenging new areas and changing old habits.  I realized this is what I need!  I’d follow her anywhere.

From there, body buzzing, I went on to the delicate, blonde, balletic fairy princess Natasha Rizopoulos for the workshop Rock the Boat: Navasana and Core Integrity.  Many of my students rest one hand on their mid-belly and say, “I have to engage my core,” with little idea of what that means.  What, I wondered, would Natasha say of this much-touted and misunderstood zone?

She whipped through a functional anatomy lesson and gave a divinely evolved class on the subject, offering an analysis of the many muscles involved, jumping up to demonstrate with her hyper-mobile slender limbs and crystal clarity.  We worked ‘em all — from the deepest tiny muscles joining one vertebra to another, to the abdominals that wrap all the way around to the spine.  She, too, asked us to explore whether the mind’s cry to stop came from flagging of the flesh or fatigue of the mind.

When time for home practice is short, she suggests an efficient series of five planks, five boats and a few long prone backbends — shalabhasana.  Challenging the popular over-emphasis on the strong rectus abdominis — the fabled “six pack” — as a cure for back problems, to my delight, she articulated the orchestral nature of our musculature — some instruments prevail, but all are playing.

I ended my day with Gary Kraftsow, purveyor of Viniyoga, specializing in adjusting the practice to the person.  You will never see a Viniyoga teacher move a crowd through their uniform paces.  Viniyogis use asana and meditation to spark change by addressing each person’s unique needs.  “Yoga is about transformation of mood, thought and behavior,” he said.  “Our intention then becomes stronger than our habit.”

He reflected, in his rabbinical manner and immaculate Sanskrit pronunciation, many years of exploration with a primary branch of yoga:  sons of the pioneer Krishnamacharya each created his own approach:  Iyengar, Patabbi Jois for Ashtanga and Desikachar into this individualized method.  The meaning of the word asana, Gary reminded us, is “seat.”  We sat, we listened, we chanted.  My mood was, indeed, transformed.

With their theatricality, their love of the crowd, the refined instruction born of deep inner exploration, in these teachers I was seeing the full flower of American yoga, tradition in transit.  Even the recent storms reverberating over the contemporary landscape — John Friend’s sex & money scandal, William Broad’s New York Times piece on yoga injuries, the closing of Om Yoga Center in downtown Manhattan — are rumblings in an extraordinary movement with marvelous variety, at its best, awakening us to our higher selves.

The weekend zipped up my practice.  For my personal practice, committed as I am to body awareness as a value, opposed to the no-pain-no-gain cliché, I saw the efficacy of effort beyond comfort.  When we are well-guided, that burning effort can be therapeutic.  I had gone from the funky dancer to the scarred, generous acrobat to the delicate fairy princess to this gentle Hindu scholar whose depth of understanding and whisper of Talmudic tradition — the love of questions, discourse and practice — emerged from the migration of western seekers to eastern wisdom.  Looking at these teachers, too seasoned to be young, all with their tales of injury, one sees the alchemy of yoga.  Here is this plethora of styles and tones, all called yoga, refined by masters to help us forge ease and understanding on the crucible of universal human suffering.  Thus my journey ended, and what a trip it was.

From shallow to profound, from mountaintop to mall, yoga has its charlatans and geeks and giants to nudge us along on our rugged path.  As it continues to evolve, this seems to me to be a peak moment, with all the light and shadow of a very lively art.

The provocative title of William Broad’s article in the January 8th New York Times Magazine – How Yoga Can Wreck your Body – has a whole nation of yogis buzzing. The news is that people can hurt themselves doing yoga. But they don’t have to. Bring some mindfulness and sound movement principles to your practice, and you greatly reduce your chance of injury.

Broad’s indictment is, well, pretty broad. His sensational warning overlooks some essential elements: the wild panoply of yogic varieties, the habits of mind and body we each bring to the mat, the vagaries of teachers’ instructional skills, and the risks that accompany all human movement – athletic or sedentary.

What are we calling yoga? Is it restorative — a few select poses with the body cushioned by props to encourage calm and gentle release? Is it Power Yoga, blending yoga’s whispered influence of British calisthenics with America’s gym culture? Are you performing asanas under the watchful eye of a knowledgeable instructor, or going through your yogic paces in a room of 50 others? Is it Bikram’s sweltering unchangeable routine of 26 poses, each done twice with zero individual feedback? Or is it an innovative class, brimming with anatomical information and a skilled instructor’s carefully chosen words and subtle hands-on suggestions? Yoga is a vast, complex field, practiced or taught badly or well.

A longtime teacher of dance, exercise and yoga, I became an Alexander Technique teacher 24 years ago because I saw it as the most fundamental approach to healthy movement, a physical alphabet, an elegant way to help people understand and unravel the chronic tensions that interfere with their comfort, productivity and overall health. I have watched my students bring their own brand of unconscious muscular tension to every activity, including yoga.

With many more people doing yoga, more will get hurt. According to Yoga Journal, 20 million are practicing and another 18 million think they should. They hear from a friend or physician that “yoga is good for you,” yet have no idea of the wide spectrum of styles and approaches. For a novice, going to a class is a leap of faith. Injury and pain result when people don’t know how the body is meant to work – with appropriate effort, ease, fluidity and clarity. That’s what they come to learn. If the teacher is performing rather than observing the class, they won’t give the specific feedback essential to a student’s progress. How can you open your hip joints if you don’t know where they are?

There are other reasons that yoga can challenge the hopeful beginner. Yoga’s popularity means that the class you attend will be shared with a multi-level crowd. Studios and fitness centers make money from high volume classes, so even the best-informed, well-meaning instructors can only lead, not teach, the group. That can make for a dynamic experience, but individual guidance is impossible. The sweat flies and you’re on your own.

The best teachers help their students modulate their efforts. They help them slow down when they rush. They thoroughly warm the body, break down the elements of a new posture and calm students’ unreasonable expectations. They help them smooth ragged breathing and offer props to help them adjust to their limitations, guiding them to build flexibility and strength gradually. They help students build the most crucial psychophysical skill: awareness.

Most injuries result from a lapse of awareness. We compare ourselves to others and, in striving to compete, strain beyond our current range. We look at a picture of an accomplished yogi and think we should look like that. What some call “ego” can lead to an obsessive, extreme asana practice. Broad gave the example of someone who sat on flexed feet for hours in vajrasana and ended up with problems walking. Yikes! You can bet that this yogi ignored his body’s distress signals for a long time. And if someone’s ribs pop out during a spinal twist, that practitioner has abnormally mobile joints or is just working way too hard.

Lack of awareness can also come from the teacher. An instructor’s uninformed, aggressive manual adjustment can push you into an unnecessarily extreme range, causing injury and discouraging you from a potentially beneficial practice. One instructor pulled a friend of mine up into the deep backbend of a wheel before his back was pliable and his hip joints open. He spent the next few weeks recuperating and avoided yoga class for a year. Now, with the all the necessary preliminary increments, he can counter the hours he spends at his desk with this exuberant, uplifting pose.

Props – widely used in most classes – can help. Broad says that noted teacher Iyengar recommends shoulder stands with no prop on a bare floor. This is ludicrous. Any informed yogi knows that Iyengar created the use – some say overuse – of props to help each student accommodate to increments of strength or stretch. Go to any Iyengar class, and you too will be dutifully folding your blanket and arranging your props, learning the detailed method that has inspired many other branches of yoga.

A great support for the new yoga student is the Alexander Technique. All people, including yogis, should learn this method’s accessible, simple principles. F.M. Alexander, to solve his own chronic vocal problem, created a comprehensive approach to the integrated use of the human body. He realized that a light, free relationship between the head and the neck restores the spine’s resiliency, making all movement safer and more harmonious. He called this relationship the primary control, and it is a powerful tool in solving our epidemic of back problems, one reason people come to yoga. When the neck is free, the spine responds.

Extreme neck flexion does not have to accompany any yoga pose. Using the Alexander Technique, we can avoid serious injury by avoiding the extreme neck flexion or extension that puts undue pressure on the entire spine and can cause back problems and spinal injuries. In a sweeping generalization, Broad writes that experienced yoga practitioners encourage extreme neck flexion. But the Technique has already influenced yoga, and recently I have heard teachers use more cues to coach their students toward an easier head/neck relationship.

For example, you can do a classic cobra with a slight, graceful arc in the neck, distributing support and effort through the entire spine. Students without this insight can crunch their heads down on the spine in any pose, not just a wheel or a shoulder stand. In fact, people have gotten strokes from extreme neck extension while having their hair washed before a haircut. And you don’t have to do yoga to acquire back or shoulder problems. You can be sitting at your desk.

Just by hunching over your computer, you can develop stenosis, herniation, sciatica, severe back pain, repetitive wrist strain, chronic headaches, neck and shoulder injuries. One of my former clients threw his back out turning a page of the New York Times. When he came to me for Alexander lessons, we spent the next few months exploring and undoing the chronic tension that preceded that injury, and he learned from it. People need to learn how to move well, whatever they do.

Fitness fads come and go, each with their own risks, rewards and lessons to be learned. In my years as dancer and inveterate exerciser, I’ve joined most of them. In the early 70s, when Kenneth Cooper touted aerobics, I donned my Adidas and ran until, 25 years later, my knees said No more! I became a personal trainer and exercise instructor in the 80s. I taught high impact cardio classes, jumping around to the Pointer Sisters. When fitness buffs’ knees cried out, along came low-impact cardio. When people bouncing along with Jane Fonda injured their hamstrings, we learned that bouncing makes the muscles contract rather than stretch. Now we’re learning that extremity, obsession, competition and inadequate instruction don’t foster a healthy yoga practice. Since physical labor went out and a sedentary lifestyle came in, as a culture we have been conducting a long, varied experiment in exercise. And some of the people Broad describes have learned, the hardest way.

The beauty of yoga is that it takes us desk-sitters and moves us through a full range of motion. We have time to focus on our breath, to find much-needed relief from our hyped-up lifestyle. We join with others who share a common purpose – to explore, stretch the mind, move the body into new realms, to feel the pulse, oil the creaky joints and clear the mind with a fresh infusion of oxygen. How many times have we – students and teachers – been transformed by the experience?

Our challenge is to make yoga a contrast to — rather than an imitation of — our nutty culture. As yoga teachers, we must watch our students and make sure that we help them unravel harmful muscular constrictions as they move. I have taken wonderful yoga classes with teachers who continue to refine their understanding of the body, the self and this integrative practice.

Using the Alexander Technique, I have guided students from teenage to elderly to practice safely and appropriately – for their age, fitness level and individual challenges. Every yoga practitioner can benefit from learning Alexander’s principles of natural breath and ease in movement so they can incorporate them into a safer, more life-enhancing practice.

And really, it’s not what you do, but how you do it. Not everyone has to do yoga, and I hope this fear-mongering article doesn’t stop a curious novice from finding a good teacher and giving it a try. We are stressed out, over-medicated, overfed and electronically bombarded. Yet more and more people find relief from our shattered medical system in the current flowering of body disciplines. Yoga is one, Alexander Technique another. Together they create a synergy, a healthy, expansive way to move through your life, that helps us lift our gaze from the screen, redirect our focus, and restore our natural buoyancy. Blending these ancient and modern arts can teach us how to best use the amazing bodies we’ve been given.

Is Park Slope becoming the new yoga center of New York City?

It’s a wet Friday night in Manhattan.  Through my apartment window, thick raindrops sound like bullets as they ricochet off the conditioner and scare the pigeons away.  My phone rings.  It’s my editor.  He says he has an idea for a story about Park Slope, how “it’s the new Yoga hub of the metropolitan area,” and he wants me to do the footwork, and check it out.

Right away my internal Manhattan “Don’t Walk,” sign flashes, as I slip out, “Have you been to Union Square lately?  You can’t walk down 14th Street without at least one Yoga mat, sticking out a backpack, poking you in the nose.”

After a spirited, Brooklyn verses NY Yoga debate, I agree to report back my findings, and determine whether Park Slope has in fact swiped the big apple’s Yoga limelight or worse yet, is cleverly plotting to bump it off.

So I venture into Brooklyn, where leaves are crispy, and townhouse-lined streets appear countrified compared to the chain stores, souvlaki vendors, and NYU hipsters that pepper Union Square.  One real looker of a brownstone catches my eye: on the corner of Saint Marks, with a wall of curvy stained glass windows.  But I don’t have time to waste on pretty.  So I dash past.  Then slow in my tracks, realizing, said building in question is my first stop: The Brooklyn Yoga School.

Lily Cushman, the studio’s co-founder greets me inside.  Cushman is a slender young woman with a patient manner.  Her and her husband Jeremy are the school’s founders, and teach the majority of classes, in the Dharma Mittra tradition, along with a handful of teachers.  Cushman tells me, “We opened BYS a few years ago for students interested in the wider practice of yoga.  Classes include a vinyasa series, standing postures, breathing exercises, meditation, relaxation, a little chanting and Yogic Philosophy.”

What makes this place different from the rest?  I ask.  Without hesitation, Cushman says, “BYS is entirely run on donations. There is a $5 minimum for class, whether it’s 60 – 120 minutes.  Anyone interested can practice.”

While discerning the differences between Manhattan and Brooklyn, Cushman tells me she lived in New York City for eight years, “What is wonderful, and challenging about Manhattan is that you can never turn it down,” she says, “it’s always on full blast.  I find there is more space in Brooklyn, both physically and mentally.”

Cushman says many of the students work in the city, “They practice on their way home from work.  You watch them settle down as the intensity of Manhattan melts off them throughout the class.”

Although Yoga is naturally calming, Cushman clarifies, “it’s much more than de-stressing; it’s an exploration of the Self.  It’s figuring out how to be happy and kind regardless of what is happening in our lives.”

Before visiting the Brooklyn Yoga school I reached out to a teacher, Barbu Panaitescu, who wrote me while snowed in, from the Rockies.  Panaitescu told me, “It’s much more humble at our space.  In Manhattan everyone is a yoga superstar, or trying to be one.  At our space, folks can come in sweatpants and don’t need to shell out $300 for a Lululemon outfit to feel like they’ll fit in.”

He made an interesting point, so I ask student, Libby Parks, what attracted her to the school?  She speaks of being “drawn to the studio because of their commitment to teaching the yoga lifestyle.” When asked to recall a specific incident, Parks said,  ‘“I remember the first time I did a proper headstand in Lily’s class. There was a moment, when I was up, that everything aligned perfectly and my fear subsided–I thought, ‘this is what they are talking about!’ It was this complete surrender and trust in myself I never experienced before.”’

Before I leave the School, I ask Cushman if there’s any connection between studio owners in Brooklyn.  Cushman says she often recommends Pre-natal students try a nearby studio called, Bend & Bloom.

As it happens, Bend & Bloom is my next stop so I get directions from Cushman, and head out.

While journeying through the Park Slope streets, I keep a watchful eye on passersby.  Several block later, I don’t spy a single Yoga mat.  But I do however notice something else.  Lots of little ones, children as far as the eye can see.  Some with parents, others heading to and from school with nannies.  Just as I’m jotting down my notes, one spunky five-year-old comes hurling down Sackett Street about to reduce me to sidewalk succotash.

His mom shouts at him to swerve away from my ankle.  After he obeys, the mother smiles at me and shrugs, “You know how kids are.”

I smile back, in appreciation of being spared the emergency room visit, and dash to the next studio.
Bend and Bloom, a former firehouse, consists of two large studio rooms, reception and changing area.  Since studio owner Amy Quinn Suplina had to pick up her children from school, the studio’s manager, Megan shows me around.

Quinn Suplina and I corresponded ahead of time.  She said, “Our primary offering is a creative, sweaty Vinyasa Flow.  We also offer complementary styles of Anusara and Forrest Yoga.”

I can’t help but ask the obvious: do you get many children and mothers at the studio?  Quinn Suplina said, “Kids enjoy yoga fun in one room while parents unwind with an hour Flow practice in the adjoining studio.  The sense of community is particularly strong amongst our prenatal and postnatal program.”

She credited cozy post-class gatherings to the studio’s friendly atmosphere, “We offer free ginger snaps and tea after class so the lobby often feels more like a café than a yoga studio.”

Beginners, she said are especially at home there,  “Our studio puts a lot of effort into nurturing new yogis,” she explained, “You’ll often find our teachers doing mini one-on-ones after class to help a student refine an element of their practice.”

I also contacted Paige Moskowitz, a student, who spoke about how their teachers had helped her practice grow, “I used to be totally fearful of inversions.  Bend & Bloom teachers worked with me and offered me building blocks to build upper body and core strength to do a headstand with confidence.  I never found that attention at other studios.”

After studying at dozens of studios, Moskowitz felt, “Yoga teachers in Park Slope are more compassionate and attentive to students’ needs than in Manhattan. They encourage me to try new postures safely, without judgment.  While Manhattan certainly has phenomenal teachers, those studios cater to volume and you end up feeling like an anonymous body in the crowd.”

When I leave Bend and Bloom, I’m pressed for time, forced to cancel my next studio visit at Bikram on the opposite end of the slope.  During my long walk, I keep my eyes peeled for Yoga evidence on the streets, and think about the scads of other studios in Park Slope I don’t have time to visit.

Last stop is, Bodhisattva Yoga, located above a sweet-smelling French bakery, in yet another beauteous brownstone.  There I meet Jessica Root and Vivekan, who run the floor-thru studio together.  Jessica, a wholesome looking woman with long brown hair, says, “We’re a true mom & pop shop.” Root discovered the studio when she was a student, and Vivekan was running it.  His teaching resonated with her so strongly, she soon made the studio her home, trained in Vivekan’s method, and eventually came to partner with him running the studio and teaching.  Root and Vivekan are the only teachers at Bodhisattva.

Vivekan, the founder of Bodhisattva, welcomes me.  He’s slender, with a light-hearted humor, and busy finishing his healthy-looking lunch.

When I ask about the style taught, Root says,” It’s a challenging, different form of alignment and mindfulness-based Vinyasa.”

Root talks about Vivekan’s style, being drawn from “the classical school of Indian Yoga, Iyengar, and Pattabhi Jois’ Primary Series.” She says she and Vivekan like to infuse the physical with “philosophical underpinnings of Indian Yoga and Buddhism, as well as scientific findings.”

Vivekan tells me that even though he’s a seasoned Yogi he mindfully tailors his classes for students in an accessible way.  Gradually, as a student progress, he introduces more advanced practices, such as chanting, breathing and meditation.  This way it feels natural for them.

I ask what’s special about their studio in particular, and Root says, “if there is something that truly sets us apart, it’s Bodhisattva no-fluff, no-BS, alternative to the commercial, mass-market, Hollywood Yoga that has become the norm.”

On my way to the door, Root tells me she they always maintain a sense of humor about what they do. “Here one can stumble, fall, make mistakes (hopefully laugh), and feel accepted among an unassuming, non-competitive crew.”

A couple of good-byes later, my feet tread down the steps of Bodhisattva, while my mind attempts to cobble together the day’s evidence. My editor was right: there were so many studios hidden in the nooks and crannies of the Slope, I’d need a month and a microscope to check them all out.  But unlike Union Square, where mat-toting locals, showcase how Zen they are, the Yoga colony in Park Slope is much subtler.  What may seem to the naked eye as a friendly old-fashioned neighborhood is actually a hotbed of studios lurking in the brownstone shadows, quietly growing more powerful day.  Hum, maybe I should warn Manhattan, its days are numbered.

Anyone who is even slightly aware of yoga knows that it’s a recreational activity that may be practiced by just about anyone – young or old, fit or rotund.

And if you’re committed to the practice, you’ll begin to see impressive results, such as longer, leaner muscles, increased flexibility and balance, and, according to the most recent research, improvements in cognitive function, including memory skills. Other reports claim that regularly practicing yoga may make people better equipped to deal with mild to moderate pain (without the support of medication) as well as improve insomnia and reduce stress.

In 2010, the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine reviewed more than 80 national research studies that examined the health benefits of yoga and found overwhelming evidence that the ancient practice is “as effective or better than exercise at improving [a person’s overall] health.” As a result, doctors everywhere are recommending yoga and meditation to both healthy and diseased patients as a method to improve and restore good health.

Some people think that yoga is just about stretching, but there is much more to it. Learning from a professional instructor is useful, as he or she can help you improve your technique and avoid injuries, such as overextending your stretches and possibly pulling a muscle. However, once you master some basic techniques, yoga is something you can tap into for the rest of your life, either on your own or with a master yogi by your side. To get you started, we’ve rounded up a few of our favorite places to bend and breathe. Namaste!

Bend & Bloom Yoga
bendandbloom.com
708 Sackett Street (b/w 4th and 5th Aves) Brooklyn, NY (347)
987-3162
Bend & Bloom is a gorgeous new studio that offers more than 50 yoga classes each week in various skill levels. Bend & Bloom teachers nurture new yogis to help them develop a life-long love of yoga. They offer regular monthly beginner workshops designed to help students feel confident in their first class. In the workshops, students explore foundational asanas (yoga postures), proper alignment, pranayama (breath) and meditation. Students also learn how to use yoga props to ease tight muscles and to cultivate a healthy, safe practice. Advanced and intermediate yoga, prenatal, kids, and family yoga classes are also regularly available. Availability: Both early morning (7:00AM) and late-night (9:15PM) classes are held daily. Check online schedule for further details. Amenities: Plenty of one-on-one attention and free ginger snaps and tea after every session. Also, since Bend & Bloom a two studio space, parents with young children can enlist them in a simultaneous (but separate) children’s yoga lesson. Mat rentals are available. Cost: $99/month unlimited membership; three-class workshops for beginners are typically offered monthly ($30); two weekly community classes and a work-exchange program (help clean the studio or assist at the desk in exchange for class credits) are also available to those who require financial assistance. Drop-in classes range from $14 to $18 per class. Bonus: A variety of ongoing weekend workshops further immerse people in their practice with sessions dedicated to beginners and those seeking advanced instruction, including learning to teach. Check website for further details.

Bikram Yoga
bikramyogaparkslope.com
555 Fifth Avenue Brooklyn, NY
(718) 788-3688
Founded by native Indian Bikrum Choudhury, Bikram Yoga of Park Slope (one of many Bikram Yoga Centers in New York City) welcomes beginners and those who are more familiar with yoga to go through 26 Hatha yoga postures in a heated environment. The uniqueness of the session, during which the room is heated to 105 degrees Fahrenheit, enables sore muscles to stretch with less pain. The heated room also promotes sweating and the release of toxins from the body. Note: No latecomers will be admitted; it is recommended that you arrive 20 minutes before classes begin. Availability: the Fifth Avenue location and 7:00AM at Flatbush Avenue. Both studios are open throughout the day and late evening classes are scheduled at 7:30PM and 8:00PM. Amenities: Changing rooms and showers; towel and mat rentals. Cost: Single class ($20); five classes ($90); 10 classes ($170) and up. Unlimited 30-day and 90-day passes are also available at $175 and $465, respectively. Bonus: Members may switch between both Brooklyn locations, which each have their own character, schedules, and staff . Sign up for Bikram Yoga’s e-mail list for discounts.

Bodhisattva Yoga
bodhisattvayoga.com
442 Ninth Street (at 7th Ave), 2nd Fl. Brooklyn, NY
(718) 449-YOGA
Bodhisattva Yoga provides individualized instruction (classes are limited to fewer than 12 people) and emphasizes the importance of establishing a basic foundation to yoga and its approaches, including a type of Vinyasa yoga created by Vivekan, the studio’s founder. Each class is individually tailored to the skill level of its participants. Th e studio, which is located in a classic Brooklyn brownstone, is warm and inviting with refinished wooden floors and the scent of natural Tibetan incense. Latecomers are admitted, but please try to be on time. Availability: Early-morning classes are given daily beginning at 7:00AM and some late nights (10:00PM) are also available. Patrons may view schedule online to make reservations. Amenities: Changing rooms and mat rentals and props (blocks, straps) are available. Cost: First class ($10); one month unlimited pass ($95). Bonus: Ongoing weekend workshops, retreats, and teacher training sessions are scheduled in a variety of skill levels. Check website for more details.

Kundalini Yoga
kundaliniyogaparkslope.com
473 Thirteenth Street (b/w Prospect park West and 8th Ave) Brooklyn, NY
(718) 832-1446
Kundalini Yoga in Park Slope is part of the 3HO Foundation, a non-profit foundation based in New Mexico that offers the teachings of Kundalini Yoga in centers throughout the world. Kundalini Yoga combines posture, movement, breath, meditation, mantra, and relaxation to work on your body, mind, and spirit. Classes combine moments of meditation and relaxation as well as working through various postures. Beginners and those experienced with yoga attend in classes that are oft en mixed. Drop-ins are encouraged. Kundalini Yoga works to balance the glandular system, stimulate the nervous and immune systems, and improve strength and flexibility. Availability: Early morning (7:00AM) and evening classes available; closed Fridays. Amenities: Yoga mats are provided free of charge. Cost: Each class is $15 or six classes for $75. Bonus: Information about workshops and other one-time events can be found on the website or by subscribing to the Kundalini Yoga e-mail list.

Yogasana Center for Yoga
yogasanacenter.com
118 Third Avenue (at Wyckoff/St. Marks)
(718) 789-7255
Yogasana Center was founded by Kristen Davis to teach the subtle aspects of alignment-based yoga by assembling some of New York City’s best yoga teachers. From years of self-study and acquired knowledge, Yogasana teachers have more than a decade of training and provide thoughtful, individualized attention, helping students develop a stronger, more flexible body, a calmer nervous system, a quieter mind, and a connection to their own true nature. Yogasana instructors are firmly rooted in the Iyengar tradition, known for its precision in alignment, its use of props to facilitate balance, and its slower more methodical pace and sequencing. Latecomers are only admitted at the discretion of the teacher; please be at least 15 minutes early for your first class. Availability: Early-morning classes (7:00AM) are typically available twice weekly. Check schedule for individual class times and reservations. Amenities: Lots of props and ropes to guide you through the poses and plenty of individualized attention. Plus, separate changing rooms and a bright, airy space. Cost: Classes include a six-week beginner series; beginner, intermediate, and advanced drop-in classes ($18); Yogasana Kids (infant to teenager); pre-natal, restorative, and back care drop-in classes; and an advanced studies/500+ hour teacher training program. First class special is $10. Bonus: Ongoing workshops are available; check website for details. Free trial classes are available for children.