The NYT article was undoubtedly a great piece of marketing; would it have got any publicity at all if it had been headlined “How Yoga Makes You Feel Good”? But after all the hype, what does Broad actually tell us about a scientific assessment of yoga? He certainly did his homework; over five years trawling through nearly a thousand scientific papers that have studied yoga over more than 100 years.

On the risks, Broad has definitely done a service in highlighting those posed by some yoga asanas (postures) and pranayama (breathing techniques), if not taught carefully and individually to students by knowledgeable teachers.

He gives a biological explanation for what many careful yoga teachers already know; postures that strain or put weight on the neck, such as shoulderstands and  headstands, should not be taught in group classes at a “general” or “beginners” level. He explains why: there is a risk of damaging arteries supplying blood to the brain, causing nerve damage or stroke.

For the same reason, avoid taking the head too far back in postures such as Cobra and the Wheel, or turning the head too far round in spinal twists.

That’s not to say these postures are bad for us; in the chapter on “Mood”, he explains how inversions such as headstand and shoulderstand can be deeply relaxing, reducing physical stress responses and lowering blood pressure. It’s just that in a group class, of perhaps over-enthusiastic and inexperienced students, it is hard for a yoga teacher to ensure everyone is practising the postures safely.

It is beyond the scope of the book, but it would be useful to make a comparison with the risks associated with other physical activities; is yoga more risky than football, tennis, skiing, basketball, jogging – especially if played too hard for someone’s physical ability or not coached by a knowledgeable and sensitive teacher?

Only one chapter of the book covers risks; a further six chapters assess the evidence for the effects of yoga on health; athletic fitness; healing of injuries; psychological wellbeing; sex; and creativity. Some are stronger than others; the best are those where there is a wealth of scientific study to draw from.

The chapter on health asserts there is good evidence that yoga:

• reduces stress, with physiological benefits for blood pressure and the immune system
• aids cardiovascular health by raising levels of anti-oxidants in the blood (preventing cell damage) and reducing blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol and atherosclerosis (thickening of artery walls)
• slows physical aging by improving spine health and balance, thus preventing back and limb pain and falls; and, through stress reduction, slowing the “biological clock” in the DNA of cells.

On fitness, he concludes that yoga has no more beneficial effects on athletic fitness than regular walking; and that because it slows the body’s metabolic rate, yoga is not a powerful tool for weight loss. Although he adds that its capacity to encourage mindfulness, and awareness of desires could explain why many people claim yoga helps keep them in shape.

His understanding of the health benefits of yoga emphasise the power of asanas and pranayama – and their ability to cultivate physical and mental relaxation – to enable us to take control of some of the biological functions of the body, in particular the balance between the sympathetic (fight-or-flight) and parasympathetic (rest-and-digest) responses of the autonomic nervous system.

There is a wealth of evidence that while the fight-or-flight response is really useful when we need to escape an immediate danger (it enabled our forbears to close down bodily systems such as digestion and reproduction in order to focus on the biological necessities of running away very fast from a wild animal), to be constantly in such a stressed state causes long-term damage, for example to the immune system.

And yet many of us today live in a semi-permanent state of stress or anxiety, perhaps explaining why yoga is currently so popular.

In the chapter on “Mood” Broad likens yoga practice to gaining control of the accelerator and brake pedals of the body’s nervous system. He outlines scientific studies that have confirmed yoga’s power to tackle anxiety and depression. It “succeeds brilliantly at smoothing the ups and downs of emotional life,” he concludes.

The book is less convincing on subjects where the scientific evidence is more scarce: on sex and creativity, for example. And it barely touches on the spiritual and ethical aspects of yoga, areas I describe in a separate post here, and which the scientific method has yet to explore. Along the way it gives a readable and useful explanation of the history of modern yoga and its journey from magical and religious practice in the East to exercise classes in gyms throughout the West.

Understandably for a book about science, Broad focuses on the physical aspects of yoga and that which can be measured. But that is only half of the story of yoga. He concedes that science is crude. “It ignores much about reality to zero in on those aspects of nature that it can quantify and comprehend… No equation is going to outdo Shakespeare.”

So impressed is Broad with the health and healing power of yoga he envisages a possible future where yoga will be prescribed by doctors instead of drugs to help an aging population enjoy greater wellbeing in our extended years. But he comes with an agenda; for this to happen he wants greater medicalisation of yoga training and teaching, and with it greater regulation. This is something strongly resisted by many in the yoga community, particularly by those such the UK’s Independent Yoga Network, who fear that the spiritually liberating aspects of yoga will be lost if it is taken over and regulated by the physical fitness industry.

The quietening the body and mind through yoga brings a serenity and awareness in which it is possible to experience spiritual insight. This experience is no less a part of reality because it has not yet been explained by science.

For me this debate is fascinating and exciting; it’s where science and spirituality come face to face; the 400-year-old scientific approach that has done much to free us from dogma, and self-serving authority meets the universal and timeless yearning of the human soul for meaning.

Broad’s book shows us that science has begun to explain why people for thousands of years have benefited physically and psychologically from yoga. It does nothing to explain the internal spiritual landscape that is revealed by the practice of yoga and meditation. For that you need other books, such as David Fontana’s The Meditator’s Handbook or Jack Kornfield’s After the Ecstasy, the Laundry.

Broad is not knocking yoga for the sake of it; he has been practising yoga himself for some 40 years. But in a new book, of which the NY Times article is an extract, and which I review in a separate post here, he sets out to explore the scientific evidence for the benefits – and dangers – of yoga. He says many of the claims for yoga’s powers of renewal and healing are true. He writes that “yoga can lower your blood pressure, make chemicals that act as antidepressants, even improve your sex life.”

My own experience is that my 46-year-old body, that has had two babies, and various misuses and abuses over the years, seems to be healthier, stronger, and easier with yoga.

The problems people experience in yoga today are perhaps because we lead very different lives to the Indians who developed yoga over thousands of years: they typically squatted and sat cross-legged on the floor, naturally maintaining mobile hips and strong backs; we sit in chairs all day, hunch over computer screens and then walk into a yoga studio now and then, ignoring our lack of flexibility and other physical problems.

Our culture also has an attitude problem. We are always aiming for results, achievements, getting more, aiming higher. We take this attitude onto the yoga mat: reaching further, holding longer, believing we must “get better” at ever-more-difficult postures. These nagging, competitive, striving voices inside us ignore our bodies’ objections, which are voiced through pain.

This approach to yoga overlooks its eastern philosophical grounding. Yoga is not an exercise regime; it’s a way of life guided by yamas and niyamas, sanskrit words that translate as “restraints” and “observances”, but which are basically tenets for a good life, including:

• non-violence
• truthfulness
• non-covetousness
• contentment
• self-education
• meditation on the divine

Yoga does include physical exercise, or Asana. We do, after all, have a physical existence and only one body to last us all of this life, so it’s a good idea to look after it. To do so, we need to bring yoga’s philosophical tenets on the yoga mat: we can be non-violent to  ourselves, by listening to our bodies; we can be non-covetous by letting go of goals for our physical achievements; we can be truthful about our realistic abilities right now in this moment. Yoga is actually a “practice” – for the way we live our lives.

It’s useful to contemplate that a loose translation of the Sanskrit word asana is “sitting comfortably and still”.  My therapeutic yoga teacher and inspiration for much of what I teach, Susi Hately, has a suggestion: whatever the asana or posture you are practising, are you “sitting comfortably and still”? Or are you tensing, straining, aching, in pain? If you are, she says, “you aren’t practising yoga… you’re ‘doing fitness’.”

But Susi also says she understands and has compassion for why it is difficult for so many of us Western yoga-fans “to get it”. It’s back to our culture and its preference for the “end”, not the “journey” or the “process”.

So does this mean that “some people should give up yoga all together” as someone interviewed in the New York Times article suggests? Susi reckons that that assumes that yoga consists only the physical postures in their classic form. But in fact, you can modify yoga postures and supplement and prepare for them with therapeutic techniques derived from a modern, scientific understanding of the way bodies move.

Above all, take a gentle, non-competitive approach to asana, in which the only “goal” is learning to be more fully aware of your body and to listen to its wisdom, even its truths you your ego would rather not hear.

Susi says: “Perhaps in those times of injury, it is actually time to read up and embody the yamas and niyamas so the journey back to the mat, the journey back to living the life you want to live, through great yoga therapy and then modified asanas, is one of exploration, curiosity and awe.”

So I’ve devised a gentle version that puts less strain on the lower back. It’s all about keeping knees bent, folding from the hips, not spine, and rooting through the feet into the ground to engage core stability. With that all going on, you might be able to find more ease and softness in shoulders and neck.

If you’d like to give it a try, here below is my attempt to draw it with stick men. Please remember to listen to your body – and never push through pain.

Meanwhile, if you’d like to sponsor me, you can donate online here. All contributions enthusiastically received! And if you’d like to take part in the event at Yoga Point on Sunday 26th February, please contact me to book a place and I’ll send you a training programme and sponsor forms. You can also download a Yoga-thon training programme here.

Nick the flashy smuggler and money-launderer, who had acquired nightclubs, restaurants and boats and had trafficked everything from cannabis to cocaine between South America and Europe for 15 years, became a man of spirit. His prison cell became a place of spiritual retreat. For the next five years he meditated, read every yoga book he could find, and practised yoga, day in, day out.

“Jail is the best ashram,” says 40-year-old Nick, who was released from jail and returned to England in 2010. “You’re locked in 20 hours a day, no interference from the outside world.  You are alone to find yourself, meet yourself and your fears.”

Nick, who grew up in Tulse Hill, south London, had first encountered his dark side aged 18. The son of a south London policeman and a nurse, he had been a champion skier, competing for England when he broke his back in a skiing accident. In the seconds it took to tumble down an Alpine mountainside his career was destroyed – and what he thought was his future.

“All I heard from family and friends was ‘what a shame’,” recalls Nick.
“The accident swung me from one end of the pendulum to the other. As a kid I’d been cocooned in the world of sport and I didn’t know what the appeal of drugs was. But when my broken back ruled out skiing again, I went to the south of France and lived like a tramp on the beach, eating out of bins, and I started dealing drugs.”

By 21, he had his first conviction – and a three-year jail sentence -  for smuggling 100kg cannabis from Spain to England. “I went into Maidstone prison as a boy and came out a hardened criminal,” he recalls. “I had been taken under the wings of many of the old-school gangsters, educated on the rights and wrongs of international drug smuggling and taught all the criminal codes.”

After that he lived a profitable life of international crime and for 15 years got away with it. “Smuggling was my drug – getting away with it was a high,” he says.

All that changed in 2004, when he was caught with 200kg of cocaine in his Argentine warehouse – bound for England.

“I thought I knew an awful lot about everything,” he say. “I thought I was invincible. I had an overinflated ego that was out of control. I’d turned into a monster.”

He pleaded guilty – taking the rap for his gang – and was sentenced to 10 years. The first year was in the main part of the prison, notoriously known as “Infierno” or Hell, relying on gang membership for protection and food.

“l was sleeping on a concrete floor, no windows, no food, having to fight other prisoners every day to survive. Literally, Hell.”

Through corruption and connections, he managed after a year to get moved to a better part of the prison and eventually to his own single cell, which he called his “Apartment”. It was there his journey in yoga began in earnest.

“I feel I was given a chance by God, the Source, whatever you want to call it, to re-form myself. I experienced a shift in consciousness, a shift that is necessary in any addict.

“It’s in my make-up to be very competitive and adrenalin-driven. I needed something to fill that gap. For a while, it was drugs and then smuggling.  Some people might say I’m now an extreme spiritualist or yoga addict. I don’t drink, smoke or eat meat.  But if I am a yoga addict, at least I’m addicted to something healthy. I believe we are pure spirit – eternal – and that this physical reality is just a manifestation of the ego.”

Nearly two years after his release, Nick is living and teaching Ashtanga Yoga in west London, and co-writing a book about his life.

He says: “I do feel balance in myself. Yoga operates on so many levels: mental, physical, emotional, spiritual. It saved me from  myself.”

I’m organising a charity yoga challenge in 2012, raising money for the Prison Phoenix Trust, which supports yoga and meditation in prisons. If you think you could raise £108 in sponsorship and train to complete 108 sun salutations on Sunday 26 February, please join me and Nick at Yoga Point in Brixton. Contact me to take part.

Lots of my students turn up to class with varying kinds of back pain. Stiffness in the upper back, neck and shoulders is common. It’s where lots of us hold our tension – and working at a computer doesn’t help.

Lower back pain, sometimes involving sacro-iliac pain and sciatica also show up quite frequently. But time and again I’ve seen a course of gentle yoga help people reduce their pain, improve their range of movement and find greater ease.

But, I also offer a loud shout of warning: SOME YOGA CAN HURT YOU!

Yoga is a fantastic system, developed and tested over thousands of years, but the truth is many of our modern, rich-world bodies with their stiff hips, tight hamstrings and tense shoulders, are not physically capable of some of the classical yoga asanas (or postures).

I think it’s wreckless to take a bad back to some of the more dynamic yoga classes, such as Vinyasa flow, some Astanga, Kundalini, and hot Bikram yoga. For a bad back you need a gentle, therapeutic approach to the ancient wisdom of yoga.

You also need a teacher who encourages and helps you to listen to your own body. Pain is a message your body wants you to hear. But it takes practice and experience to tune in and hear it. Ignore its whispers, and it will start to scream!

While the energy of a dynamic group class can be very invigorating, if you have back pain you need to be careful that a competitive atmosphere doesn’t prevent you from hearing your body’s whispers – or even its screams.

So the kind of yoga I would suggest to someone with back ache is the kind that has worked for me. Twice in the last 18 months I’ve twisted awkwardly whilst unloading the dishwasher (you’d think I’d learn!) and found myself unable to move. On both occasions I got myself pain-free within 7-10 days by “treating” myself with yoga. This is what I did.

Initially after injuring myself, I lay flat on the floor, with my knees bent, to allow my back to relax completely. Then over the following week or so I went through a gentle yoga routine each day focusing on:

• developing core stability
• gradually moving hips and shoulders
• breathing well
• always moving within a pain-free range of movement
• being very “aware” of my body and letting go of excess tension

This is the kind of yoga I teach in private sessions and at my weekly classes in Brixton and Streatham Hill. But there are other teachers around – not just me – who offer this gentle approach. At Brockwell Lido in south London Antonia Pollock offers an excellent healthy back class on Sunday afternoons. Others who, like me have trained with therapeutic yoga teacher Susi Hately, and Scaravelli-inspired teachers, such as Ed Fellowes, Kathleen Beegan, Tracy Bickley, and Marc Woolford also have this approach.

What these teachers offer is a holistic approach that gradually enables us to find the freedom to move with grace and ease – and no pain.

Rooftops of Wyatt Park Road

It's lovely and bright up here

Our sloping roof panel

Up close and beautiful

One of the panels carried onto the flat roof

I’ll post soon about the costs and returns of all this…. suffice to say for now I’m very much looking forward to the electricity company regularly putting money in my bank account soon thanks to the Microgeneration Certification Scheme and Feed In Tariff Scheme.

Brockwell Park 30 September, 2012

1. Get outside

OK, so south London isn’t the south of France, but sitting in my back garden, with my chair pointed in the right direction I can look out on greenery and sky while I eat my breakfast. And there’s Brockwell Park, Tooting Common, Streatham Common…

2. Home-cooked food

Lucy, our host at Les Aleis, prepared delicious home-cooked veggie meals using produce from her garden. I’ve managed to grow a few tomatoes, potatoes, spinach and rhubarb this year and am making the most of them… and I’ve got the bread-making machine out of its dusty corner so I’m starting each morning to the smell of a freshly baked loaf.

3. Swim

While the boys were having their swimming lessons yesterday I pootled up and down the pool at Brixton Rec. For half an hour I could almost imagine I was swimming in the sunshine in the River  Viaur.

4. Yoga

Of course, I’d say that. But it doesn’t have to be a daily class – just 20 mins of whatever you enjoy will do you good. If you’d like to buy my new 1-hr  gentle yoga audio CD, drop me a line.

5. Find some quiet

On the bus, in your bedroom, looking out of a window… doesn’t matter where. Just switch off electronic devices, put down newspaper or book, close your eyes or stare blearily into the middle distance and bring your awareness onto your breath. For the next 5 minutes or so be curious about your breath – where you feel it and how it feels. If you mind is distracted, gently bring it back to the breath. No expectations, no goal, just see what happens. Try to find a little time every day to do this.

Any other tips? Let me know yours. For inspiration, there are lots more pictures from our six days in France here on Facebook.

By slowing down, focusing on the breath, and listening to the flow of energy through your body, you can find grace and poise in these beautiful postures.

The three-hour workshop gives us the opportunity to go more slowly and deeply, applying modern therapeutic techniques to the ancient wisdom  of Hatha yoga. Learn to hear your body’s voice and move in tune with its wisdom.  Discover your own wonderful warrior energy to take back into your yoga practice – and beyond.

To enquire or book a place contact Chris on info@yogawithchris.co.uk or call 07866 801177.

Work starts week 1

Work started on our new roof and solar panels this week. We’re taking advantage of a scheme the last government brought in where you pay for solar panels to be fitted, you get cheaper electricity – AND you get a guaranteed inflation-proof income from the electricity companies for the next 25 years.

Yes you did read that correctly. At up to 8% p.a., it’s got to be one of the best returns you can get on your savings at the moment – and you’re helping to combat climate change in the process.

You can read all about the so-called Feed In Tariff scheme here and I will blog here about how it goes over the next few months, first as our new roof goes on (we decided to save getting scaffolding up there twice by replacing our 100-year-old roof before the panels go on), then as the panels get fitted, and eventually as our lovely cheap electricity starts to flow. If there’s any hiccups in the scheme, you’ll hear about them here.

The old roof

So far, my main observation is that scaffolders have very fine muscle tone and roofers are nice and friendly with a very Zen attitude to the weather. “It is what it is,” they said thismorning as the rain poured down.

1. Yoga and the quest for the true self – Stephen Cope

This is the book that got me thinking seriously about training as a yoga teacher some years ago. It’s a personal memoir of a psychotherapist’s own journey into yoga. You won’t learn any asana (poses) but might be inspired by the gradual yet profound healing yoga can bring to hurt minds, bodies and spirits. He’s also got a Facebook page.

2. Yoga: the spirit and practice of moving into stillness – Erich Stiffmann

This is a book I come back to again and again. It’s a guide to hatha yoga and meditation by a world-renowned teacher. Its detailed descriptions of asana help you feel a way into poses from the inside. There are pictures to see what they look like, but also frequent reminders to listen to your own body and hints of what you might feel. The guides to meditation were ones that gave me my first glimpses of a creative stillness within. Overall, an accessible way in to yoga philosophy.

3. Mother’s Breath – Uma Dinsmore Tuli

This is the best book on pranayama (breathing) I have ever read. It’s by my antenatal yoga teacher, who co-runs Sitaram partnership, based in south London and Stroud. Don’t worry that it’s designed for pregnancy and childbirth – here are practical and inspirational descriptions of breathing exercises that open up a whole new internal world of the breath. Once I began to explore, my yoga was transformed and I found a new level of awareness and freedom to move and be still.

4. Advancing your yoga practice: the art of slowing down – Susi Hately Aldous and Leonor Mowry

Seven classic hatha yoga poses, such as downward dog, triangle, and warriers I and II – but interspersed with therapeutics to build strength, flexibility and ease. Susi Hately applies a modern understanding of anatomy to the ancient wisdom of yoga and creates a safe and liberating practice free from the aches and pains that plague so many of us – yogis or not. Anyone who has been to my classes in the last year will recognise this approach;  and there’s more to come as I’m just off to do further training with Susi.

Yoga beyond belief: insights to awaken and deepen your practice – Ganga White

Ancient yoga philosophy made meaningful and useful for today. This is a book to pop into when you have a few minutes to spare – you’ll pop out with a profound and practical idea to try out on your yoga. For example, vary which side of your body you use first. If it’s usually the right, try the left. In the process, become aware of your habits and use that mindfulness to make the changes you want. Full of excellent advice on developing a personal yoga practice.

So if you’re off to the beach or have a long flight to get through, ditch the bonk-buster and get your head into some yoga! And if you’d like a gentle one-hour yoga session to practise at home, contact me to order my new CD.