Bikram Yoga... {IIPM B&E Article}
...in heat, or just plain beat?
An art, about 50 centuries old, the gateway to eternal bliss and ultimate spiritual enlightenment… the soultwisting, spirit churning objet d’art called Yoga – moulding the interior monologue of the soul for that ethereal and incorporeal tranquility. What’s so new about it, you ask? Nothing much… just that this ancient discipline is itself stuck in a tug of war! One between an organisation of yoga-studio proprietors and instructors called the Open Source Yoga Unity (OSYU), and the acclaimed yoga guru, Bikram Choudhary, whose decision to enforce exclusive rights on a series of pranayamas and asanas has upset the yogis across the world! Yoga (in essence, the union of the mind with the body, and of the spirit with The Spirit) has traditionally meant the attainment of spiritual luminance by the practice of certain moral and ethical principals coupled with physical exercises. It’s now evolved into a variety of derivative philosophies and practices that work the body and the mind through isometric postures (asana) and breathing excercises (pranayama) and achieving intellectual tranquility by relaxing the mind through meditation. A branch within that system is called Hatha Yoga, which was propounded by Yogi Swatmarama and is now being carried forward by many, including Bikram Choudhary. Since the early 1970s, this proponent has opened numerous yoga schools and certified instructors from his college now number in hundreds. Though this yogi’s belligerent claims for the reservation of copyrights and trademark for his “sequence of 26 asanas (sic!)” has earned as much condemnation as praise, his conspicuous style of ‘yoga done in a hot room’ (105 degree Fahrenheit) or more generically called the ‘hot yoga’ still remains high-flying. Along with the innumerable disciples-in-waiting still knocking at his door, there stand equal number of lawsuit holders against him who do not seem to have liked the idea of this cultural legacy struggling with ownership issues. So, as this fight over the controversial Intellectual Property Rights on Bikram Yoga continues, let’s get down to all other exercises and games we know of, lest all of them get patented one day! Make hay while Mr. Choudhary does some bit of his ‘own’ work out – ‘sidestepping’ conscience, ‘running’ down to the court and ‘pushing’ his luck hard!
An art, about 50 centuries old, the gateway to eternal bliss and ultimate spiritual enlightenment… the soultwisting, spirit churning objet d’art called Yoga – moulding the interior monologue of the soul for that ethereal and incorporeal tranquility. What’s so new about it, you ask? Nothing much… just that this ancient discipline is itself stuck in a tug of war! One between an organisation of yoga-studio proprietors and instructors called the Open Source Yoga Unity (OSYU), and the acclaimed yoga guru, Bikram Choudhary, whose decision to enforce exclusive rights on a series of pranayamas and asanas has upset the yogis across the world! Yoga (in essence, the union of the mind with the body, and of the spirit with The Spirit) has traditionally meant the attainment of spiritual luminance by the practice of certain moral and ethical principals coupled with physical exercises. It’s now evolved into a variety of derivative philosophies and practices that work the body and the mind through isometric postures (asana) and breathing excercises (pranayama) and achieving intellectual tranquility by relaxing the mind through meditation. A branch within that system is called Hatha Yoga, which was propounded by Yogi Swatmarama and is now being carried forward by many, including Bikram Choudhary. Since the early 1970s, this proponent has opened numerous yoga schools and certified instructors from his college now number in hundreds. Though this yogi’s belligerent claims for the reservation of copyrights and trademark for his “sequence of 26 asanas (sic!)” has earned as much condemnation as praise, his conspicuous style of ‘yoga done in a hot room’ (105 degree Fahrenheit) or more generically called the ‘hot yoga’ still remains high-flying. Along with the innumerable disciples-in-waiting still knocking at his door, there stand equal number of lawsuit holders against him who do not seem to have liked the idea of this cultural legacy struggling with ownership issues. So, as this fight over the controversial Intellectual Property Rights on Bikram Yoga continues, let’s get down to all other exercises and games we know of, lest all of them get patented one day! Make hay while Mr. Choudhary does some bit of his ‘own’ work out – ‘sidestepping’ conscience, ‘running’ down to the court and ‘pushing’ his luck hard!
posted by IIPM Mission @ 4:23 AM
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