Priorities |

I’ve had a few folks send me this recent NYT piece – “How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body.”

There are a few things you should consider when reading that article.

First, it’s way too long.

But second, the author is as much a representative of American cultural trends as the way Yoga is practiced in America these days is.

This type of journalism is “sensationalist” in a sense, and not very magnetically written.

Here’s the formula:

Trend
Something that supports/counters that trend
Soundbite/interview
Another factoid
Soundbite/interview
repeat the above as many times as your word-count limit will allow
Semi-conclusion statement that leaves things totally vacuous…i.e. “makes the reader ‘think’”

Ever read a NYT piece that matches that description? I think every other writer in America has that template loaded on their desktop these days. It sucks.

And, of course, he has to mention “neurology” which is the go-to evidence of the day. Ten years ago he would’ve cited genetics as a reasonable cause for Yogic breakdown. Before that it would’ve been chemical precursors. Before that it would’ve been the humours in the body causing the pain.

“Hast thou pain from thy Yoga practise? Thou must be bled.”

As I mentioned above, the way Yoga is done in America nowadays is a cultural phenomenon. It reflects American relationships with the body, with teachers, with others, and with nature.

First of all, people are terribly out of shape generally. Yoga is not the discipline to get you “in shape.” I don’t care how “hot” or “power” it is.

But secondly, all of this ranting and raving against specific practices is leaving me wanting.

Any physical practice done poorly, by someone with little training, who has a limited history of movement (in their entire life as well as their daily life), who has little common sense or curiosity, is going to cause pain, dysfunction, and injury.

Basically, what I’m asking you to consider when you read articles like this one is a simple question:

What’s the real source of the problem?

Is the source of the problem actually that people are doing Yoga?

Or is it that our culture creates, engenders, and supports a manner of living that separates things into individual compartments, shuts down creativity and curiosity (and common sense), and generally debilitates people?

What’s so difficult about this is that, in order to confront it, you must confront your deepest-held convictions. You must go against the grain – in yourself and in your social life. It’s hard. It’s work. It’s hard work. Without support, it will drain you till you cry “UNCLE” at the top of your lungs.

But you have to try. You have to try to read through terrible mass-media articles about should’s and shouldn’ts. You have to work to educate yourself in all areas. And I have a suggestion for how you can start.

Most folks tend to define themselves or the things they do in terms, usually, of a single dominant preference. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, consider briefly that there might be a single word or phrase that would adequately describe the way you do everything in your life.

Now take that, and say that your guiding principle in life is to more fully express the potential embedded within your unique physiology. But in order to do that, you must understand that physiology thoroughly.

This is the start of the path.

My good friend Kwame Brown recently posted an article from the Star Tribune’s “Your Voices” site, entitled “Stadiums versus our children’s future.” The article asks why $1 billion would go to a new Minnesota Vikings stadium, while funding for Early Childhood Development (ECD) seems impossible to get.

I posted a response to the article on Kwame’s site, which I am republishing in full here. I’d love to know what you think about this.

Interesting article, for many reasons.

This argument is old as the hills.

What blew me away was his honesty, right up front. The author says – “I’m not sure it was a realistic choice (in part because I love the Vikings).”

This is how he initially frames his review of different policies and reasons for ECD. So the entire time, in the back of our minds, we’re thinking “it isn’t realistic.”

He sums up by serving another seemingly insurmountable blow to the whole concept, quoting the unnamed state legislator, who says – “It’s simple, at the Legislature it is about entrenched interest and power and children don’t have either.”

How are we supposed to feel when we read an article like that? Does it lead us to come up with solutions, or merely to shrug our shoulders at the progress of the “inevitable?”

The question posed (which is never explicitly posed, or expanded upon) is “How do we get more funding for ECD?”

Priorities will always be priorities. But priorities are shifted by action. The Minnesotan’s love of the Vikings is a priority that is manufactured by media, social persuasion, and everything underlying that (desire for power? money?).

The question is, how do we shift priorities, or at least make our priority (ECD) seem like a valuable partner-priority to already existing, dominant priorities?

Tax-breaks are one way. Why do we always see those United Way campaign commercials from NFL footballers? Well, teams/organizations and individuals get to write off charitable donations. Maybe that’s one way.

Another way is one that Arne Naess recommended the “ecological” movement in the 1970′s take – to make an economic argument for “green.” It took a lot of years for people to grasp his message, but now that it’s happened, you see it everywhere. Everything is sold as “green,” and people come together under the “green banner” to get things done (even very opposite groups, like Exxon and Greenpeace).

Under the “green banner,” and all of the ideals and slogans that it stands for, corporations can see a way to continue to make profits while serving the people’s desire for efficiency and ecological-friendliness.

Many of the efforts for ECD, or childhood development in general (including play and physical education, arts education, and education generally), fail to recognize this important fact – their “customer” is the organization from which they’re seeking assistance.

That is, they need to market to the groups they want help from…

Instead, these groups often just talk about their own interests – like a selfish boyfriend or girlfriend. “Blah blah blah, I want more money for the children…” is all the owners of the Minnesota Vikings hear. They drink their wine, look around anxiously at the other tables in the restaurant, wondering how the Redskins owners got that good looking partner, and why they’re laughing and having so much fun…they excuse themselves to go to the bathroom and then make a break for their car, never looking back.
Consider this – how would you create a “product” out of Early Childhood Development? What would that product look like. What problem would it solve for the people who could buy it (who are not children, by the way…they are adults, and in the case of the article listed, corporations)? What are the compelling fears and desires of your customer (those adults and corporations), and how can you appeal to those fears and desires in your marketing? How do you solve their problem? How do you put the risk of buying your product on yourself, and take the risk off of your prospective customer? Finally, how do you sell it? And once it is sold, what happens next?

Tag Archives: priorities

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Priorities in Education