The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › General Hot Yoga Discussion › Motivation and Inspiration › My teachers never hold poses long enough and they include long savasanas IN THE WARM-UP! I need your help!
The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › General Hot Yoga Discussion › Motivation and Inspiration › My teachers never hold poses long enough and they include long savasanas IN THE WARM-UP! I need your help!
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What should one do if the Bikram teachers at one’s studios do not respect AT ALL the length of poses? For example, what do you do if there are 20 second savasanas between poses in the Warm-up, you never get anything close to a 45-60 half-moon or standing bow pose, standing separate leg is sometimes no more than 5-10 seconds, I kid you not! etc.?
The teachers where I go are not going to change: they work to the level of the most beginning beginner. I’ve become bored in the room, and even depressed today as I realized that my heart wasn’t even being challenged.
Any suggestions?
I would say 1. talk to them
2. hold the poses longer yourself with shorter rest
3. push to your limit each poseIs class 1.5 hours total?
barky
HI Barky,
Thanks for the reply.
Well, I have spoken to them. To no avail.
Secondly, you must know how many Bikram teachers operate, and not just where I am. They take it PERSONALLY when you start a pose before they begin. Some teachers (not where I am) get angry–again seeming to take it personally– when you have to come up for a rest before THEY let you. The best teachers I’ve had (not at my studio) are not like this.But I WISH that I could go down before they let you, e.g. while they’re chatting between sets in the warm-up or between different poses in the warm-up. But I know they would get angry and HURT. Very odd.
I’m open to all suggestions!
Jane
One more thing, Barky.
Yes, you’re right. A good thing is to try to push to one’s limit each pose. I find however that this does not compensate for what is lost in long savasanas during work out.
Yes, class is 1.5. But you see, you can do a 1.5 lesson, even get all the dialogue in BUT put it where YOU want it! That’s what they do, and then tend rush towards the end. So even in the ‘yoga’ part we’re often not getting what we need. In the yoga part it’s not that the savasanas are really too long, but some of the poses, usually Janushirasana with Paschimotthanasana and Ardha-Matsyendrasana, are done really quickly. There is really very little time to stretch. In the workout portion it’s really a pity that Dandayamana-Janushirasana is done in such a way that you’re coming up before you’ve gone down!
As I said, I have traveled around, experienced other studios. I’ve used the Hot Yoga Doctor to see what the time-lengths on the poses, etc. are supposed to be. They’re doing it incorrectly at my studio, and when you’ve done it within Bikram time-frames you know how different it feels. I would suppose that the health benefits are different. One’s endurance level is definitely different.
I just wonder that Bikram himself is not strict about this with respect to the people he has certified. Are the time-frames less important to the Bikram method than the sequence is? Would you happen to know that?
Thanks,
Jane
Wow, too bad
I practice at a small Bikram studio where the average class is 4 to 5 with new comers every so often. I find that is when we hold the poses the longest. The teacher takes more time. I would hate to be in your predicament. I guess I only know the “one” way and we have a great instructor (diane polli) who is sensitive to all our needs and “reads” the class so well. And thats coming from a professional facilitator, me.
I like the timing on then Bikram cd and thats from the horses mouth!
Barky
Samba Beach NJYeah, it is too bad. I have a friend who is deep into her Bikram practice and who would not even consider a job in my area because of the way it is practiced here. She tried doing what you suggested: going down in the poses earlier in order to get more time. This only brought her grief from the owners/teachers.
Yes, all of our needs are not being met. And, in particular, the newcomers are attended to; although I would say that, in fact, by not providing the proper timing, their needs are not really being met.
You are lucky. When Bikram classes are how they are supposed to be they’re harder, but they’re wonderful!
Hi Jane and Barky!!!
It is hard to say what the needs are of the people running the studio Jane goes to. Perhaps they have very low expectations of what people are capable of. I don’t suggest that yoga is the place to test your students to ridiculous levels. It is great to discover more of your limitless potential in a humble yoga studio. But clearly by your account, the needs of the students who are in the room, are not being met and not even when you go and tell them what your concerns are.
One thing that you can’t really do is do your own thing in this situation. If the teachers are teaching a class and they give a 20 second savasana and you want to start the next pose, then it would potentially bring up all sorts of issues – spoken and unspoken – for just about everyone in the room.
>> Despite the fact that your needs are not being met, there is a basic premise when you go to class that the teacher will call the shots as to the timing and your job is to listen and respond.
>> One of the primary concerns would be not being able to surrender to the instruction and therefore there would be SO much self-talk. If it were me I would consider it to be untenable. I am sure that it would be very hard to approach your practice with equanimity, ignoring the will of your teacher to approach your practice their way. Not to mention the issues of disrespect that would possibly enter your mind and that of others. Frankly I don’t think you should do it. Approaching poses in a way that is tweaked to give you better benefit because the instruction given is inadequate or potentially dangerous is a completely different matter. I think most people will know where I stand on that!
As for the newtimers not having their needs met – they really don’t know what they don’t know. Their first experience is guiding them to expect something similar. What a shame that they really don’t know what they’re missing.
What I can say is that one of the great things about a properly timed hot yoga class (and yes, even great classes vary in timing depending on the tempo, vibe, energy levels or abilities in the class) is that they are ANYTHING BUT BORING. One of the reasons that this yoga works is because there is something to do almost all the time. When the breaks are too long then the mind will most likely be distracted and start to think too much. Our minds are so busy that a slow class actually creates the exact opposite effect to the one I think your teachers are trying to avoid – boredom and restlessness, REDUCED ability to meditate.
When you use your body your mind has less time to think. You would probably be aware that it is in your times of stillness in the body that your mind can be most active. This is why Savasana can be your hardest pose. It is different if you have an active class and you have savasanas in between to recover and rest. But if your whole class seems like one big savasana then you may as well go to a Raja yoga class (meditation class). Hot yoga is a beautiful blend of physical exertion and mind cleansing to create a wonderful meditation. I am so sad for you that you can’t get what you want.
It sounds to me Jane as if you have already approached your teachers to no avail. Have you got no ally on the teaching staff that you can maybe be curious in your questioning about why as a group they choose to time it the way they do? Perhaps your curiosity with them will open up the way to understanding and create a dialog so eventually your wants and needs can then be heard and understood. Maybe the first port of call is not to complain but to seek to understand them!
Perhaps after you hear them out (because everyone wants to be heard 😉 ) you can ask them what they would do if they were you. Paint the picture and use the word ‘you’ with the aim of putting them in your shoes for a minute. If you get a self-serving answer after you have done your level best to stay curious and keep your emotions out of it then … well maybe that studio is not the place for you.
If you can’t get what you want and need then perhaps you are left with ‘voting with your feet’. But if you have that conversation based on curiosity about THEM first then maybe you have a chance. Even if that chance is to tell them that you won’t be attending any more if things don’t change.
Does it sound like something you can do? Try a different approach and see it from their point of view? What do you think?
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂Thanks Gabrielle for your thoughtful message.
I agree completely with all that you are saying. You are right: it would be untenable to try to do the yoga in timeframes different from those they are giving. That would only lead to a conflictual situation.I have spoken with one of the teachers. She KNOWS, I think, that I’m not getting my needs met. But the owners set the agenda. And it’s interesting. You mentioned an ally on the teaching staff. Well, a new person did join a few months ago. She is/was excellent. It was clear after a week that she was no longer to teach the way she knows how to teach. I remember after the first class she taught students saying, “I can’t do her class!” So maybe there were complaints, especially given that these students would have never experienced Bikram method anywhere else. They thought she was over the top. Well, as I said, it was clear to everyone (not just me) that ‘something’ made her modify her teaching style a great deal, plus they cut back on her hours. Actually, it’s really a pity because the studio could work in such a way that you have the teachers who, from my point of view, do not respect Bikram timeframes, and they could attract the students who don’t know any better or who prefer class that way. Then they could have had a few alternative teachers; and I bet the strongest students would gravitate towards them.
So I think it would be very find to ‘talk’ to an ally on the staff. I feel as though I would be putting such a person in a bad position, esp. given that I’ve seen already what has happened to her.
Believe me if there were another option where I live I would vote with my feet. I think that what I’m going to have to do is work on other things in this yoga course. For example, the savasanas are long. So perhaps I will have to work on keeping my mind still; treat it as though it were a meditation course. (Still it’s disappointing. I know how hard I struggle to make it through a REAL warm-up. So when I walk out of that room, as I did yesterday, without that struggle, I know something is wrong. No, I didn’t all of sudden just get stronger in my practice.) I find–but you my think–and you would perhaps be correct–that if I go into this course with my mind pretty worn out from working really hard at something during the day I manage to –well not surrender– but just ignore the fact that I’m not really getting what I came for, and just take what I can get, which is still something.
But really, I want to thank you for all your thoughts. Maybe I’ll start a new forum on a pose. Namely, half-tortoise. People want so desperately to do standing bow. I just want to get my butt to touch my heels. I’m wondering what I can do to work on that, in the yoga the room and outside of it! :red:
Jane
Dear Gabrielle,
I this post of yours in one of the other forums. You wrote:
“However poor treatment or experiencing dogmatic teaching is not an uncommon occurrence. I won’t go into details but something similar happened to me to prompt me AND my husband to NEVER go back to a particular studio. I can tell you right now, that several readers from this forum have now abandoned their studio because the treatment was so bad, that they have now rented office space. They have formed a co-op where they can all get their yoga needs met!”
Well, maybe this is what might happen (although the issue here is not poor treatment but the Bikram practice not being really respected.). Who knows? Another guy, who also travels and has done Bikram in other places, had already said to me last year that he was dissatisfied with how the Bikram was being delivered and that he was thinking about converting a room in his house into a Bikram room and that perhaps others might want to join in.
One has to feel people out. I live in a small place, and this studio is small and gossipy (I don’t mean in a bad way. I just mean that people talk.). So you have to be careful. But this kind of co-op might be just the solution in the long run! If we couldn’t get one of the teachers to help us, we could use some of the tapes you offer. I really enjoyed using one of the downloads I got from you.
Namaste,
Jane
PS Others might consider such a solution if they have too many problems with their Bikram studio. -
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