Yoga Is Medicine

08/02/2026

Over the decades, I have collected and misplaced and lost and found my handwritten records of HUNDREDS of spontaneous statements, made by my yoga students, just after class, or on their way in. They are fleeting, they are brilliant, they are funny, and they slip through our collective consciousness in a way that builds a very special bond.

My graduate school advisor once said I should write a dissertation chapter titled "Things People Say to Me at the Front Desk". She was right. It is rich with truth, it is absent of filters, it is overflowing with experience.

It can hardly be captured. But here is one tiny drop in the ocean of that treasure.

Here's one I just ran across, dated October 2023.

05/10/2026

I know it's been quiet on this page, but there's been a ton happening behind the scenes.

Make sure you check the blog and your inbox to keep up with our goings-on, both programmatically (a major training coming up SOON!!) and philosophically.

Here is one of the recent blog posts to feed your mind/soul/being. 😊

In a world quietly training us to go it alone, Original Hot Yoga offers something rare: a circle of healing, trust, and embodied humanity. Come discover what is really happening in the hot room.

02/10/2026

How fast should I be moving while practicing The Original Hot Bikram Yoga?

But wait, Isn’t a yoga class supposed to based on stillness?

Yes, thank goodness. All asana are held in stillness, and the majority of ANY yoga class should be held in the best stillness you can muster. (This is one of the things that makes it accessible and effective during phases of injury or other physical challenges!)

However, we do have to move to get into a posture, and we have to move to get out of a posture.

So, here’s a quick tip for remembering how fast or slow to move while transitioning into and out of each asana:

“Move as SLOWLY as you need to, but as QUICKLY as you can.”

Be careful of sloppy fast movements, and watch out for unnecessarily slow movement.

Your movement control will improve dramatically, during yoga class, but also especially in all of your daily life moments!

Finally, on your slowest days, you can still be quick with your mind and instantaneous with your concentration. When you follow the words and attend to the body parts that you are hearing about, you will get benefit even if you aren’t moving those body parts very much.

I love to hear the stories of how you have handled this in your practice. Feel free to comment here so we all can learn from you!

02/07/2026

Feeling restricted and struggling to breathe in Rabbit Pose? You're not alone; it's a common challenge, especially when you're new to the practice!

Most practitioners and teachers of The Original Hot Bikram Yoga know the directive phrase “Postures Holding Stillness, Breathing Always Normal.” But we forget - or never grasped - the final four words of this directive:

Which are:

“According to the Posture.”

Yes, there is a specific breathing technique that coordinates with each of the 26 postures!

As you learn how to apply these techniques, you will be able to:

— feel stronger in each posture

— create more relaxation in each

— enable more comprehensive stillness

— hold stillness for more time

— GAIN energy in the class rather than deplete it

— dramatically improve the sustainability of your practice

One example is Rabbit Pose.

Rabbit Pose (*Sasangasana)* is a head-to-knee pose where the spine and torso are flexed forward. Anytime we do this, the body is restricted from taking a complete, muscular inhale. So if we try to take a “deep breath”, we will likely feel stuck or that we “can’t breathe in Rabbit Pose.”

The key is actually to NOT take a deep breath once you’ve started rounding the spine.

The key is to EXHALE slowly and completely

Over all, we learn to understand the specific breathing techniques in each posture. When you get the technique right, you'll find ease and relaxation even while you're challenged!

Watch to learn the secret to breathing well. And let me know your experiences and questions!

02/05/2026

Struggling with Locust Pose (also called *Salabhasana*)? I mean, who doesn’t? That’s the one where your body is squishing your arms to the floor, and the palms are on the ground.

(note: it is so great for helping to reverse carpal tunnel, and for helping to heal so many other arm and neck issues!)

Regardless of how high you can get your legs, breathing can be challenging at first.

After all, the position of your arms - and the contraction of your back muscles - somewhat restricts the movement of your rib cage. So, if you are trying to take deep breaths in the posture, you are likely going to feel stuck, or extra challenged.

Here's a tip to reduce your struggle: Instead of trying to take a full, completely expanding inhale as you lift your legs, try to find a middle range for your breath.

Do not try to completely inhale, nor to completely exhale. You’ll create more stability if you take shallower breaths.

Just make sure that “shallow” does NOT mean fast, nor panicky.

Using a middle range of the breathing range of motion should ideally be directed towards being smooth, well-controlled, and ultimately slow.

I’d LOVE to hear how this goes for you! Try it out for a few classes and leave a comment below.

02/03/2026

Struggling with Camel Pose? You're not alone!

While it is true that we need to push the hips forward, and we need to learn to breathe well while backward bending the spine, there is something MISSING in most teaching of this posture.

What else do you need to do with the lower body?

There is an opposite force that is needed to stabilize the posture.

And that is a deliberate downward pressure… or pushing down of the feet into the floor… or leaning into the tops of the feet-ankles!

The “hips forward” needs to always be done IN COMBINATION with this more subtle - yet necessary - effort of feet-ankles being grounded.

Because camel posture needs a firm stability. This - and all other postures - is NOT about how far you can go or how bendy you are.

The magic that happens here is both instantaneous AND long-term.

Your abdominal wall will learn to relax. Your breathing will be able to shift into relaxation. Your nervous system will respond accordingly. It is so amazing.

I’d love to hear how this goes for you!

Leave me a comment here.

01/30/2026

What if I told you that “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, YOU’RE WRONG.”?

Let’s explore.

What does it really mean to say “I can!” or “I can’t!” to yourself, during your yoga practice?

What does it mean to say “I can’t.” when it comes to trying yoga in the first place?

Or to say to me after class, “I can’t do that one,” referring to a specific posture.

Or to say about your favorite posture: “Oh yeah, I can do that one!”

The fact is that all of the above statements take us out of the present moment.

That century-old Henry Ford quote (”Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.”) is only useful in the context of noticing positive and negative self-talk.

But it distracts and diverts us from paying attention to the present moment.

It CATEGORIZES the posture, and seals the posture into a STORY. Neither of which have to do with the attending to the subtlety of what is happening in your breathing and your body.

Also, consider this: is there really one single moment, over the course of your years of practice, when “can’t” turns into “can”?

I hope not. We are learning every moment that we practice. We are attempting the postures always. Are there “ah-ha” moments, when you experience a breakthrough of understanding, muscle control, relaxation, or other technique? Sure! But those will be happening for as long as you practice. There is INFINITE learning in every asana.

I beg of you to NOT put postures into the “I can’t” box. And to set aside the tendency to say “I can” only when a posture is going according to expectation.

Watch your language! ;) It DOES matter.

01/28/2026

What is a mind-body connection, really?

And what does it have to do with the constant, simple instruction in an Original Hot Bikram Yoga class?

Well, the “dialogue” as we call it, is the key to some of the most powerful mental benefits.

It is the exact method that we use to create and sustain a constant connection between the thinking mind and the physical body, in the present moment.

By putting your concentration on the teacher's exact words—like "arms”, “left”, “right”, “stomach in”, etc. you establish immediate links between the mind and the body.

And as you train your discipline to sustain this concentration, breath by breath, minute by minute, you get to experience a meditative state.

Where no new stress is created, and the stresses of yesterday start to dissolve.

It is a miracle!

01/27/2026

Is Bikram Yoga “too intense”?

Is it just for the “Type A”, ultra-competitive?

If you read the tabloids which run the internet and masquerade as journalism, you might think this is the case.

But the gossip is not the reality.

The beautiful Paradox of Intensity is that the class is not inherently intense.

Each and every practitioner, each and every day, is the one who chooses how intensely to practice.

Yes, the postures are the postures.
Yes, the room is heated.
Yes, it is a 90-minute situation

But if we don’t take ownership of how much we do or how hard we push, we remain disempowered.

When we realize, through our own physiology and breathing, that WE can dial up or dial down our efforts, we work towards freedom.

I learned this the hard way, i.e. the best possible way, when I fractured two vertebrae in my lumbar spine. Just 9 months into my practice, I was gifted the experience of being forced to back off, slow down, and concentrate in a way that only pain and injury can bring.

It is really a miracle. I’d love to hear your experiences and stories about intensity in the Original Hot Bikram Yoga!

01/24/2026

For the first several months (and years!) of your yoga practice, it is really important to allow for a "trial and error process".

Every day, your body is different. Your mind is different. And your energy is different. We are not machines, and we are not consistent.

Unfortunately, if we expect our human body systems to perform like a machine, we can reject the yoga process very quickly.

Or we can give up when we hit the first obstacle.

But it is not that the body actually is the problem.

It is a problem of philosophy, a problem of expectation, a mistake in approach.

Yoga, especially Bikram Yoga, will reveal underlying patterns like:

—stress
—dehydration
—emotional eating
—foods that make it more difficult for your body to thrive

So, make sure to attend as frequently as possible as a beginner. And ASK when you run into an obstacle, or an excuse, or an injury.

Give yourself opportunities to try different things—from what you eat the day before to when you drink water.

You'll learn so much about yourself if you keep showing up!