Excessive Heat/Humidity

Hello Sara

For decades Bikram was asked how hot the room was supposed to be heat and what specific humidity was best. His answer usually included profanities and the basic message was simply “I don’t care what temperature it is. Just heat the room hot”. That’s just putting it nicely.

A friend of mine was there when a certain person (not Bikram, and not to be named here) decided on a whim, after having realised that if they quoted a figure, then the question wouldn’t need to posed again. They (she) decided to answer with the oft-quoted 105 degrees etc.

From that day forth (sounding rather biblical here) those figures have been quoted as if they were scripture. They don’t take into account the heat index. They don’t take into account that you can drop the temp and increase the humidity to get the same result. It’s just a bloody good myth ascribed to Bikram as if it were indeed a sacred utterance.

I find it an absolute shame that some (not all!) teachers pay more deference to some arbitrary numbers than their students. If you have people who cannot get through the class, if there is more than a reasonable 1 or 2 students taking a very brief break once or twice in the class, then there is a problem in the room. It’s something that needs to be fixed. And contrary to some responses, it’s not the students’ fault.

Regular students or fit and healthy students don’t usually need to take any break. So if a teacher sees a handful of those students on the ground then the temperature or the humidity (or both) is too high.

You asked what you can do. Well, you can approach the teachers/owner with the other people who are possibly feeling the effects of mild heat exhaustion, and request that they drop whichever factor is easier to do. There are places where a dehumidifier is required because the ambient humidity is high. So usually it’s about dropping the temperature and usually nobody minds paying less for power! 😉

You can make sure you are well hydrated and you include sufficient sea salt in your diet. I would make sure I had a pinch of salt in my water for during class (and to make it taste better add a couple of drops of lemon juice). Basically you want to make sure you keep the potential of suffering the heat exhaustion that is likely to be occurring to a minimum. Drinking plain water may not be good enough in this instance because you are likely to be sweating a lot and therefore losing your electrolytes.

You can practise at home! Yep, it’s not the same if you love the joint practice. Some people prefer it at home. You do have to be more disciplined because it’s easier not to go. If you practise at home you’ll be able to modulate the heat and once again enjoy getting through the entire class.

On that point I guess your teachers could be thinking that you should be some kind of trooper or martyr and push through whatever it is that is stopping you from getting through the whole class. To that I say, and I am sure you will agree, that that would be ignoring your own voice, or defying one of the fundamental precepts of yoga which is being the observer. The thing that I think a lot of yogis could be missing is that they are fine being the observer but in cases such as these, they may not be processing and using the information that they are observing! It’s the missing link. :cheese:

I hope that helps. Come back and tell me your thoughts

Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂