Rants & Raves

RANT

$178 for a yoga sweater that doubles as a meditation blanket?

$995 for yoga sweat pants?!

#$%@#$%

I'm so disgusted by the idea of paying a month's rent for a pair of sweatpants that I'm not even sure where to begin this rant...

What I will say is that clearly these people have missed the entire point of yoga... Yoga is a practice of non-attachment. It is about observing your current situation and being ok with things as they are.

Yoga can also be an excellent form of exercise, both physical and mental. But no matter what yoga means to you, what you wear is of little, if any, importance.

From Yoga Journal...

A couple of years ago, when I had just returned to Yoga Journal after six months of traveling to ashrams and holy sites in India, I got a call from a writer for Mirabella magazine who was researching a fashion spread on exercise wear.

"I was wondering" she said, "what is the traditional outfit for doing yoga?"

I thought of the naked yogis I had seen on the banks of the Ganges, their skin smeared with ashes from the cremation pyre to remind themselves of the body's impermanence, their foreheads painted with the insignia of Shiva, the god of destruction. I couldn't resist.

"Well, traditionally, you would carry a trident and cover your body with the ashes of the dead," I told her.

There was a long pause, during which I could practically hear her thinking, "This will never fly with the Beauty Editor." Finally I took pity on her. "But alternatively," I said, "a leotard and tights will work just fine."

Naked, or covered in ashes, or in spandex, or in your pajamas... Whatever you wear, yoga is most certainly not about acquiring material possessions or showing off your wealth.

The silver lining in this story is that very few people were willing to pay $178 for a yoga sweater. So now it's on clearance...

Now on the Clearance rack

RAVE

High school runner Mary Cain finished her SATs then shattered the all-time high school mile record with a pace of 4:32.78 - a pace 6 seconds faster than the previous indoor mile record and more than 2 seconds faster than the outdoor mile record!

Image source

But she wasn't done yet...

For her encore Cain went on to finish third place overall in the 2 mile race, with time (9:38.68) that crushed the prior high school track record by more than 17 seconds.

Coached by Alberto Salazar, it looks like Cain's running future is bright.

I hope she also nailed the SATs...

What are you ranting or raving about this week?