Twisting Myself Into Bikram Yoga Positions

I’ve walked to work many times enough to not be able to avoid a yoga studio advertising Bikram yoga classes. Yoga? Hmm. Bikram yoga. What? Walking by that studio everyday made me really curious as to what it is and why were the people coming out of it so sweaty.

My research (coughGooglecough) has yielded these facts: Bikram yoga is a style of hatha yoga (exercise yoga) developed by Bikram Choudhury about 35 years ago. Basically, it’s your basic run-of-the mill yoga, but done so in a room that is kept at 36®C and an average humidity at 60 percent. The heat is said to facilitate the pliability of muscles, thus making it easier for people to get into various positions. Sounds easy? Have you ever been outside one hot, humid summer? Okay, now try do yoga poses while breathing that hot, humid air. Still easy? I thought so.

Still, I wasn’t too scared to try even for that trial one-week period they were offering. Curiosity always wins over.
For my first day I was asked to wear something dri-fit or anything that wicks away sweat from the body. Cotton, they say, would absorb the sweat and weigh me down. I was also asked to bring a beach towel, a face towel, and a bath towel. That’s a lot of towels but I was glad to have listened because I was sweating like nobody’s business. And the room, oh the room. It was h-o-t. The instructor had to contend with panicky beginners wanting to migrate to cooler places (i.e. the bathroom). The second day was much easier, probably because we knew full well what to expect in terms of the heat.

As for the bikram yoga positions, there are easy ones and there were hell ones. A few of the bikram yoga positions I remember distinctly well:

Pranayama Series – standing deep breathing series. That was pretty much it.

Padangustasana – toe stand position. With a bit more practice I could get better with this. It’s like standing on tiptoe on one foot, your knees fully bent, and your other leg in a lotus seating position. Basically you’re supporting your entire body weight on one tiptoe. Yeah, I held that position for a grand total of 2.3 seconds.

Savasana – dead body position. What do dead bodies do? Lie lifelessly. Needless to say, my favorite.

Ardha Kumasana – half tortoise position. The first time I saw the instructor doing it I thought, “There is no way.” I gave it a good try though. Okay, not so good. You sit on the floor with your legs spread out in front of you, and then you stretch your torso to the floor so that your legs and torso are now level. Then you stretch your arms out back flat on the floor, and your legs are over your arms. I can’t even explain it to make it sound easy.

There are 26 bikram yoga positions and you go through each one of them in a session. The good thing however is that you don’t have to do anything you can’t do. Nobody wants injury, of course. I must admit, however, that seeing the advanced bikram yoga class get into those spine twisting positions I can’t help but wonder that they were once beginners too. Perhaps there’s hope. Maybe I should register for a month’s worth of lessons.