Yoga Schools and Styles
The Nerds
These are the geeks of the Yoga world. You will know them by their endless dissecting of poses along with their nerdish tinkering and adjusting. The teachers of this style will tend to view you as a simple sub-routine in the lofty program of Yoga perfection. Their grand Yoga program, named "True Yoga", was passed down to the disciples of the Nerd school from one of the greatest of all the Yoga Stars; Great Great Yoga Father Super Yoga Super Star.
If you participate in this style of Yoga, expect to be poked and prodded by the instructors as they adjust you endlessly. You will be abandoned in poses for long periods of time as they confer among themselves whether you are matching the output of their input. You will, no doubt, find them staring at you wide-eyed, like zoned geeks mesmerized by a misbehaved computer program on their computer screen.
As they continue to examine your alignment, they will eventually pull out and consult their sacred Yoga Bible, "Right-On Yoga" , written by their CYO (Chief Yogic Officer). The Nerds will try hard to figure out just what is needed to do to get you, their errant sub-routine, to align and output properly. They will use tape measures, slide rules, sextants, a Global Positioning System and possibly even a measuring device that uses the decay level of Cobalt 52 to measure the positions of the sub-nuclear particles lurking deep within your pose.
There will be low, obsessed chattering, nods and shaking of heads among the Nerds as they move around and examine your pose to see if you are anywhere within the desired specifications. Once they have determined that all their input has been correct and have faithfully followed their Yogic Bible, they will shake their collective heads as they confirm that the problem is obviously you. You are BAD (Biologically Alignment Dysfunctional). Being BAD, it will confirm to them that you are too underpowered and perhaps even obsolete, to run their ideal program of Yoga Nirvana.
At the point of being determined BAD, you will be directed to a pile of props to help compensate for your total inability to align properly. You will see blankets, blocks and straps. In addition, you will see other props resembling medieval torture instruments, such as the wheel and the rack. Look for their fine collection of thumb screws to assist the Nerds in getting your thumbs in just the perfect alignment. You should also notice a wall with ropes attached to it and a hook and chain suspended from the ceiling (affectionately called a pelvic inversion swing). The Nerds use these as you advance in your studies or become immune to the other previous methods of alignment. An Iron Lung might also be spied in a corner, though The Guide is not sure how the Nerd school is using this at the moment (email us if you know).
The feel and tenor of a Nerd class has been likened to the equivalent of attending a conference entitled "The Patterns of Interstellar Dust Particles Three Nanoseconds after the Big Bang". Other have compared it to watching paint dry. Though these classes will be boring, endlessly repetitious and totally lacking in humor, you will, nonetheless, be surprisingly amused by the teacher's total lack of social skills and graces. You can enjoy watching the teachers foam at the mouth as they ridicule the Jock style of Yoga with their breathing, jumping, feigning and jabbing peculiar to that Yoga style. But most entertaining of all will be their rants against the Emos -- regarding their use of candles, music and incense. The Nerds will tell you they are not trying to achieve an "out of body" experience like the Emos claim, but rather an "inner body" experience.
TIP: You must never, never ask a question in a class in this style of Yoga. If you do, you may become victimized by the stone-faced look of the teacher's face and be labeled a "problem child" from that day forth.
BONUS TIP: Never ask if they could play some Yoga music, light some candles or burn incense. This will insult them greatly. The Nerds demand a sterile environment and you will be subjected to a 20 minute lecture on why they don't go in for that hippy-dippy stuff.
Next School of Yoga - The Jocks
Styles of Yoga
