This is personal. Yes, I hate yoga. It's one of those things that I try to explain to people and somewhere in the process of doing so, I sputter with rage, at which point, the person listening usually stops in order to dismiss me as a nonsensical anti-inner peace doofus. So here goes my final attempt to clarify my position without the rage part.
First, yoga as a philosophy and yoga as we know it today are two very different things. The original yoga philosophy dates back millions of years ago with Buddhist monks in Nepal. It's the simplified notion known today as mind over matter, but its practice is much more complex and painful. The principle is that your mind and spirit should be able to overcome any and all outlying forces surrounding it, and through this practice, find inner peace outside of your physical self. This is the principle of walking over hot coals without feeling pain, staying warm in a snowstorm with no jacket, staying cold in sweltering heat with no shade. It's endurance. It's overcoming outside forces through inner strength and discipline. This philosophy accepts pain as a natural and powerful force and encourages pain to be a part of one's daily life.
This has absolutely nothing to do with stretching or pretending to be a tree. Stretching, breathing, tree-posing are all good for you in their own way. But they are not yoga. The yoga that we know today has been whittled down, simplified, and packaged as part of a lifestyle brand. This lifestyle brand doesn't come cheap; it requires expensive top of line ethical clothing, large expensive studios, and weekly commitments to classes, classes and more classes.
Yoga brands have managed to create a need in society. This need has been spurred on by the idea of our hectic lifestyles and how disconnected we are from ourselves and nature. This is a need that could be met by simply taking a walk outside with your cell phone turned off. It doesn't require studio space, an instructor, a fancy mat made of bamboo, $80 seaweed pants, soft music and organic tea. Finding the disconnect is a choice and it's a matter of not allowing society pressure you into thinking you need things you don't or that you need to live a life you don't want to live.
Perhaps the most ironic part of this is the fact that many yogies tend to believe that they are doing just that by taking up yoga: making a choice to disconnect and reconnect with their inner self. But by buying into the yoga lifestyle which has been marketed so well to the public, you are not living an alternative life, you are conforming to exactly what the brands want you to do. And it's a lucrative business. So lucrative, in fact, that yoga has celebrity endorsements and has been seen as a hallmark of an ideal, vibrant California cool lifestyle. And that's another source of my frustration with it.
This isn't to say that the quest for inner peace is silly or useless. This is just to say that the yoga brand is probably not the best vehicle for achieving it. If inner peace comes truly from within, turn everything off for a few hours and reflect quietly. You might be surprised at what comes to you. And it won't be seaweed pants.
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I hate yoga. I hate the pants. I hate the music. I hate the instructor's pseudo-soothing voice. I hate the rolled-up mats that people drag around with them in perky little over-the-shoulder bags. I hate yoga pants. Did I mention that I hate yoga pants? But most of all, I. Unapologetically. Unswervingly. Hate. Yoga.
ReplyDeleteThank you for listening.
I forgot to mention the ugly little garden gnome buddha statues and dime-store incense. I hate those, too.
DeleteI am SO glad you are with me on this!
ReplyDeletei found you by googling 'i hate yoga'..because i too hate yoga..i particularly hate the way it highlights the idiotic herd mentality and underscores how stupid consumers are..i hate the pants too; especially when worn at work..
DeletePerhaps its meditating you should try. Some people take yoga the same way they will go for a run. Its exercise. Gets your mind off things.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, while yoga has been whittled down and evolved into some other than its origin doesnt make it less important. Its just a new thing, with new benefits and people who embark on it should try and have a new mind set towards it.
Thats all....
This is a great post. I actually fit the exact profile of someone who should like yoga: I am in my 30's, I went to a liberal arts college, I like shopping at Whole Foods, and enjoy all movement activities, such as hiking, skiing, dance, ballet, and gymnastics. But yoga? I have tried it and retried it and I hate it. Like the other poster, I found this site by searching "I hate yoga" and what surprised me was how few results actually showed up when I typed those words compared with how many positive, re-enforcing, pro-yoga articles.
ReplyDeleteIt almost seems sacrilege today to say: "I hate yoga" if you are a young, urban person, but I find it so hard to believe that all those people I see in classes or walking around urban areas, like NYC, with their rolled up mats, actually think sticking a leg up in the air to do a three-legged dog is a grown-up, meaningful after work activity. In fact, most of the adults I see in yoga classes, the few times I've been, look remarkably juvenile to me, like it is not so much yoga they like--but the experience of being in a class with other people in their age range.
Furthermore, it seems absolutely not acceptable these days to not list yoga as a "favorite activity" if you are say, an educated urban professional. But, if you say do something else for a recreational activity that is different from say the common picks for most college educated 20/30 year olds (here I would list going to the gym, running, and yoga as the most common ones), people look at you as if you are odd. For example, I do ice skating almost five days a week for my activity of choice, and, yet most people I explain this to, think I am crazy, even though I actually work at it at a very high level.
Finally, I have to add: I just think all those people out there who keep saying they love yoga are just pretending. What is to love about lying on a plastic mat in a pool of sweat and pretending to be a tree, or, a boat while some other urban professional next to you gives a nod like she/he just could not be more pleased with her/himself for managing to do a yogi big toe stretch?
As I said before, I think most of the people in these classes are just looking for a community and a simulation of some type of first grade level course instruction. Exercise, strength training, and flexibility improvements are just token achievements for these people because 90% of the "I love yoga" types I've encountered look like they really have very little natural sense of body awareness.
Yoga is a rare experience done right, I've come to understand. It is not something at this stage in my life I am interested in. But I also believe that if done right it should have absolutely no mass appeal as it is simply NOT fun, though there will always probably be a fringe percent that in their odd ways will enjoy it. Bless them, because they can take their incense and music that sounds like the wind blowing or ocean swishing and enjoy that stuff on their own, without me.
Inner peace. What the hell? Who says that is the goal in life? Don't we get plenty of peace after we die? Sure we can have moments or pockets of it to recharge but looking for some permanent state of absence of inner conflict is to hate life and to seek a living death. We should struggle with ourselves. That's part of life's richness. Do what floats your boat and makes you happy sure. If that means yoga lifestyle accessories, knock yourself out. But don't kid yourself about some higher spiritual plane or touching the divine (whatever the hell that is). And don't kid yourself about simplifying your life. It will never be simple. That's just lifestyle obsession. Any effort you put into this goal of simplification is extra effort that further complicates your life. What does simple mean anyway? Absence of defining characteristics? Those are just linguistic constructs. Simple doesn't have an objective reality of it's own. Everything is messy.
ReplyDeleteWOW! Couldn't have said it better! Exactly, they think simplifying your life is jamming an hour of sweaty farts into their busy schedule.
DeleteOh sweet Moses!! THANK YOU FOR THIS!! My husband and I were on one today when we were doing some stand up paddling. It's not big here were we live, but it's catching on. So to my surprise,OH LOOK there are other paddlers! As we go closer I noticed they aren't paddling...they're 'downward dog'. My husband started laughing out loud and said, "What the hell are they doing?! That looks so stupid!!" There they are floating in the water on their boards, doing freaking YOGA. Oh my god it looked so stupid! If you've spent time on the water, you know sound travels well. While striking their poses one girl was talking NON STOP about herself and "yoga" this, and "when I start my yoga business" that. We approached them quietly, trying not to snicker too loud and listened to this air headed valley girl go on and on and on about yoga. I wanted to drift by and say "SHUT UP! YOU'RE RUINING THE LAKE FOR EVERYONE!!" In the mean time, they could only do 2 poses...wannabes at best. This had been bugging me all day. I worked at Whole Foods for 5 years (slit my throat) and have had a new job for about 6 months now. I just got weaned off hearing all the self centered, better than you yoga freaks talking about themselves all day and prancing around in they camel toe pants. So when I saw an even more ridiculous way all the try-hard yoga idiots try to show off, I wanted to tear my hair out until I got it off my chest. Stand up paddling is awesome and they're making it looks stupid. They can sit on anything that casts a shadow, lift a leg over their head and licking their butt and they would call it yoga. I don't even know what I'm saying anymore, all I know is the bug the crap out of me. They're a bunch of try-hard, show offs who thinks their shit doesn't stink.
ReplyDeleteI want to say thank you to all the people who left a comment- clearly I have been negligent in verifying this blog. It's great to see people who understand and don't look at me like a dog foaming at the mouth when I spit out the words: I hate Yoga. You guys are awesome, inner peace is overrated, and it's the attitude more than anything else that makes it so intolerable.
ReplyDelete