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Friday, September 10, 2010

Yoga is Non-Competitive

There's a Bikram Yoga Competition in San Antonio this month. I see a lot of San Antonio yogis getting excited, and while I'm not one to tell them what to get excited about, I don't share their enthusiasm.

When I first discovered yoga, one reason I fell in love with it (as a former competitive springboard diver) was that it is non-competitive and non-judgmental. That's just beautiful. Yoga is for the sake of the practitioner, because it's good for the body, mind, and spirit, also it's fun. It doesn't get any better than that. Shiny gold medals and trophies distract us from what really matters and the competition required to win alienates people from each other.

I was only a diver for a year and wasn't ever good enough to actually win, partly because of the lack of flexibility and strength at the time and partly because I only did it for a year, but I saw what the competitive spirit does. It takes all the fun out of it and makes it hard work with more risks of injuries. What could have been a great friend with a shared interest became a rival to defeat. What if I just like flipping around in the air and landing in a giant pool of water? Good luck finding a coach who cares about anything other than winning.

I saw the same thing when I did debate competitions a few years later. I'd try to be friendly, "Hi, I'm Becky. You like debate, I like debate. That's pretty cool." No way, they weren't having any of that. It's harder to treat me like an idiot if you see me as another human being who's a lot like you.

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