Yoga's Anti-Lifestyle Trend

Front page of the New York Times Style section today in "Yoga's New Wave" offers a healthy counterpoint to some of the silliness that, to my mind, detracts from yoga. The most interesting aspect to me is that the yogi features was a former disciple of Bikram - who seems to enjoy being at the pinnacle of yoga silliness and monstrous, egomaniacal behavior.

Money quote:

A second revelation occurred in class when he was struggling to keep his body in a difficult position. “I was sweating, my muscles shaking, in triangle pose, and Bikram was talking about how fast he was as a boy in Calcutta. How he could catch this dog.” The situation was almost more than Mr. Gumucio could bear. “In my mind,” he recalled, “I was thinking ‘What is wrong with you. Stop this stupid story!’ ”

Laughing! "Stop this stupid story!"

Read the piece in full here.

A Short Film about Moments

This short film (4 minutes) by Will Hoffman is beautiful.  What Andrew Sullivan would call a "Mental Health break"

I found it on KarmaTube, which described the short film this way:

Will Hoffman's short film stitches together random, mundane moments from the lives of different people. But watching this film, you feel like they are moments from your own life! The move from one moment to the next is non-linear, non-sequential, joyous, terrible and unexpected, all at the same time -- and yet it evokes a feeling of deep connection and beauty.

I just loved the way it captures mundane instances and weaves them back in a way that evokes a whole and wondrous existence. 

Enjoy!