Zoom Yoga Sucks — We Need to Gather
While we have done all that we can to make the most of practicing yoga amidst a global pandemic, as these months roll on I think I am not alone when I share that I am growing weary of Zoom.
I teach yoga. When the pandemic first forced businesses closed, and we shut the doors of our beautiful little studio in downtown Sant Cruz I was frightened of course. Frightened of what was to come. And frightened for the fate of my small business. But at the same time I was curious about the opportunity that was presenting itself for me to shift focus.
Initially, pivoting to virtual platforms piqued my entrepreneurial spirit. I could see all the ways in which yoga and wellness would be readily available from now on and forever to individuals from all walks of life who may have felt a barrier to entry before. Constraints to self-care modalities are many and include everything from simple scheduling conflicts to the more perplexing social, cultural, and/or financial barriers. I had been struggling with the problem of access for years, and felt eager to ride the wave of innovation and collaboration that could be unleashed by this mandatory disruption of the status quo. I also felt hopeful about my business’s prospects to broaden our audience, and optimistic about the tide of opportunities that would further the accessibility and democratization of what I feel are essential life tools — tools forwellbeing.
And good things are happening in our industry. But it is not making me happy. And I don’t know that you’re happy either.
As much as I have enjoyed this opportunity to expand into virtual classes, there is something that happens in the practice room that I can’t quite seem to replicate online. In person I didn’t mind teaching the fitness aspects of yoga which translate so easily to video, whether live or pre-recorded. I enjoy bringing clever and creative functional movement sequences that help students improve their physical health. I love the science of the body, and the concepts behind how tissues adapt and why to adapt them. I love helping others develop strength, flexibility and motor control. I love speaking to what is going on with the nervous system, and with our emotions. These aspects of teaching yoga translate well to virtual platforms, but they are not why I love teaching. Something is missing.
I know many don’t share my sentiments. Some students are grateful for the opportunity to practice with their very own teacher from the comfort of their home. Also, many teachers are thrilled. Teaching from one place is more efficient, minimizing costs such as gas, childcare, and travel time. Teachers can also choose schedules that suit them, rather than having to find available space in a studio, and classes can be consolidated, blending communities that were once differentiated by location. These are all good things.
But for those of you for whom Zoom is not working. Perhaps I can shed some additional light as to WHY.
I have suspected for some time, and even said as much here and there, that what we are really up to in the yoga room goes way beyond the physical benefits we receive from the practice itself, and may even be key to the spiritual or philosophical nourishment we seek there. I believe that in-person group yoga and other embodied practices serve us through a completely different mechanism than we commonly speak to. One that you might not have considered before.
In the old days we were taught that the practice of postural yoga prepares one for breathwork and meditation. The purpose of engaging with these practices is so that we may shed our attachments to the physical world — the places, people and things that distract us from our true nature — so that we can rediscover and commune with our true nature. Such communion relieves us of suffering, and puts us on the path of our life’s purpose. Despite this clear objective, modern yoga studios and their teachers rarely offer the deep dive into the more subtle practices that are considered the gateway to liberation. But why?
Outside of a more formal , monastery, or teacher training, the democratization of yoga — the movement(s) that served to bring yoga to more and more people — was enabled by a sharing of yoga practices in the absence of spiritual ascension as a primary aspiration. In the absence of a guru, modern yoga teachers and modern yoga centers offer yoga practices that are stripped of the limitations, restrictions, and guidelines (as well as the gravitas) of a formal dogma.
When ‘this is a cell phone free zone ‘ is the most explicitly stated value to which students must adhere within a yoga space, the yoga that happens there has clearly been cleaned, sterilized and repackaged for mass consumption.
As a a teacher I reconcile this disconnect by viewing modern postural practice as a system of embodied experimentation and somatic innovation with the potential to lead us into heightened states of awareness. The aim is greater self-knowledge and an elevated sensitivity to others and to our environment. Surely that is useful, even if our attachments remain. But postural yoga, as it rests in the zeitgeist, with its promise to help us with everything from the alleviation of back pain to existential angst, now exists as a product that has been branded, commodified, scaled, and positioned within the massive multi-billion dollar self-help industry that ballooned in the last century.
Furthermore, (and here I reveal my bitterness) I have come to see the promise of postural yoga to provide some kind of metaphysical benefit sourced from ancient wisdom as a ruse. Many will argue with me here, but I no longer believe the postures are magical, or even important. I no longer see the sequences (at least as they’ve come down to us) as keys to unlocking latent energy within us, special tools that unveil hidden wisdom and enhance enlightened perception. Rather, we apply that intention to a practice, any practice, and generate that experience from within.
Humans are wired to make meaning out of things. Life is complex at best, and frightening and dangerous at worst, but either way we need it to mean something. On our yoga mat we climb inside our skin and poke around at what is going on inside of us. We find a new discomfort here, and examine a new sensation there. We ride the rise of emotion, the sweep of illumination, and tap into the seemingly eternal vibration of our life force…that curious thing that animates us.
Each yoga class has an arc. We arrive and settle, we have a little conversation with our bodies and with ourselves that climaxes in some kind challenge. The challenge is often physical but sometimes intellectual, structural, visceral or having to do with mental focus. We are then led towards a resolution that may include a period of restful stretching and contemplation. And then we end with a short nap.
Making oneself available for this experience could be seen as a celebration or re-enactment of the natural rhythm of a single day, or the arc of a single lifetime condensed into 90 minutes: We rise. We tend to the body. We notice the state of things both within us and outside of us. We develop a plan. We take action. Some things happen. And ultimately we return to the body to take care of its basic needs. In the absence of Netflix we would naturally reflect (meaning), rest (restoration), and sleep (regeneration).
As we travel through the arc a class we become transported, and also transformed. We are held by the structure offered to us, by the physical space, and by time.
But what we have failed to notice is that we are also held by the presence of the others in the room with us. Not only our teacher, but our peers.
Whether like-minded or not, in that space we become accountable to others, and in turn, they are accountable to us. The expectation is that everyone has come together at that time and in that place to receive something. To be something. To feel something.
Classical yoga teaches that after the mastery of physical practice we ‘graduate’ into isolation. The promise is that we will develop the capacity to sit for long periods of time in blissful meditation. We will sit in stillness, absent from community, action, and even reflection. Needing nothing, desiring nothing. With this superpower we will be freed from ties that bind us to our attachments and to our aversions. In that state of singularity, we will ascend. But we will ascend alone.
I have a problem with this.
What is universal and largely undervalued in the modern yoga room, and what is for the most part unspoken as a value by yoga teachers, is that people strongly benefit from a place where they can move and breathe with others.
Whether in a yoga class, at a nightclub, or around a tribal campfire, moving and breathing together, in unison, especially when music is involved, provide us some of our most profound moments of elation along with a heightened sense of connection. Whether under the auspices of religious ceremony, or during the celebration of a romantic union, so long as our social inhibitions or lack of experience aren’t in the way, humans find tremendous joy and healing in moving and breathing together.
Perhaps you are familiar with the hormone oxytocin. Sometimes referred to as ‘the bliss hormone’ oxytocin is associated with the chemistry of connection and love. It is released during orgasm, plays a role in childbirth and is present in both mother and infant during breastfeeding. We enjoy oxytocin releases when we are stroking our pets and when we’re in deep conversation — especially if we are doing the listening. Oxytocin is released when we sing, during playful exercise, when we appreciate nature, and when we are falling in love. Oxytocin and cortisol (the stress hormone) work in opposition. Cortisol cannot be released in the presence of oxytocin. I love this.
It turns out one of the ways to inspire peak levels of oxytocin is to move and breathe together in groups. Think gospel choirs and Broadway finales. In fact, oxytocin levels are highest when we move and breathe together in groups while wearing similar clothing . Hello Lululemon.
Beyond our desire to become more able bodied, our yoga practice connects us to the ways in which we engage with the world and with each other through our bodies. Practice offers opportunities to better understand and resolve the internal sensations, both pleasant and unpleasant, that motivate our actions, and our reactions. All of this remains available during COVID and while classes are virtual. Through the magic of Zoom we can continue to connect to our strength, our flexibility, and our breath. But we must mourn what we have lost. Our togetherness. In that environment — the public yoga class — we move and breathe together.
COVID has cast us (those of us who found refuge in group yoga) out. We have been cut loose. Set adrift. We have lost communication with the mothership. This is not a problem everyone. Humans adapt. We move on. After all, there are many ways to get oxytocin flowing.
For some however, in-person yoga was the place that we did that. Zoom yoga will not do. Whether we were aware of it or not, we came to connect and celebrate with our peers. Yoga practices may remain intact virtually, but we have lost our touchstone; and the blessing that initially drew us has evaporated leaving only a shell of its former self. If you are at all like me you are missing something very dear to you -something that perhaps you hadn’t noticed was so important to you until now. Each other.
Originally published at https://lumayoga.com on October 9, 2020.
