Our Blog
Welcome to our blog, featuring insights and articles related to our Bikram Yoga practice and personal stories and testimony by our members.
Read the latest article
Story of a Yogi – Jayki Levy
BYSJ member since 2021, Jayki Levy shares her yoga story. How did you first discover Bikram yoga? I have always been active and became bored and tired of the gym. I desired a challenge and was looking for something incorporating a mind-body-spirit connection. My...
Michele’s Insights
Creating community for 20 years
BYSJ owner and founder Michele Vennard shares her memories and insights on the evolution of BYSJ at the 20th anniversary celebration on January 21, 2023. Bikram Yoga San Jose is this beautiful container of people with so much diversity among us. We believe in this...
Roaming the room to find my practice
I’ve completed over two dozen 60 Day Challenges at this point, but not once did I do this: practice in every spot in the room. In this third location of BYSJ, we installed these cute orange mat markers in the flooring for the 48 spots we have, making it easy to...
Savasana – the portal to peace
According to Yogapedia, the first written record of savasana is in the classic 15th-century yoga text, Hatha Yoga Pradipika. It says that “lying down on the ground, like a corpse, is called savasana. It removes fatigue and gives rest to the mind.” Google savasana, and...
Story of Yogi
Story of a Yogi – Jayki Levy
BYSJ member since 2021, Jayki Levy shares her yoga story. How did you first discover Bikram yoga? I have always been active and became bored and tired of the gym. I desired a challenge and was looking for something incorporating a mind-body-spirit connection. My...
Tribute to my father and gratitude for BYSJ
This holiday season, my family and I said goodbye to an extraordinary man who graced this world with his presence for 99 incredible years. He was a husband, a father, a doctor, a hero, a WW2 veteran, and my mentor. For the last month of his life, he struggled; not to...
Story of a Yogi – Josh Paradis
I found Bikram Yoga after suffering many injuries and trying various types of yoga and surgeries to alleviate them. My list of injuries: A dislocated knee from playing soccer, resulting in patella realignment surgery and two large screws in my leg Two broken wrists...
Bikram Yoga
Tribute to my father and gratitude for BYSJ
This holiday season, my family and I said goodbye to an extraordinary man who graced this world with his presence for 99 incredible years. He was a husband, a father, a doctor, a hero, a WW2 veteran, and my mentor. For the last month of his life, he struggled; not to...
Stretching and compression – a whole-body experience
Your whole body (and mind) benefits from your Bikram Yoga practice – literally inside out, bones to the skin. Two key techniques used widely throughout Bikram Yoga are stretching and compression. Often seen as distinct, they are, in fact, very closely related. Think...
Charge your spine!
“The spine is the source of all human energy in life.” – Bishnu Charan GhoshThe spine is the focus of every posture we do in Bikram Yoga because the health of the entire body depends on the health of the spine. In our 90-minute class, we stretch the spine to restore...
Community Resources
One week in – a letter from Michele
It’s been just over a week since we closed and already it seems so long ago. The last few weeks prior to closing were so hard, navigating the fear and discerning what’s real in this unprecedented global event. Maintaining a yoga practice IN the midst of uncertainty is THE responsibility I adhere to most, and not just with this virus, in any occasion.
Car Accident, 4:30 pm, Tues, Nov 16th, 2010
The reason I didn’t pull any muscles and could hang upside down for 15 minutes in comfort was because of Bikram Yoga. The reason I am alive is because of the grace of God.I was driving north on I 280. It was a clear, cool, sunny day. I just got into the far right lane...
Right Brain versus Left Brain
This is a fascinating talk by a brain scientist, Jill, who had a stroke and came out the other side with the knowledge that we are all connected and that half our brain works this way naturally while the other half differentiates ourselves as separate beings. It takes...
Newsletters
Time for More
This week was a turning point for me. Maybe for you, too. After learning that we were going to be sheltering in place for at least another month, I had to take a deep breath and a nice long walk. I had to soak in the idea that BYSJ will most likely be a part of Phase...
Breath and the Nervous System
Bikram Yoga Teacher, Misha Soltis, recently led us in our daily 10 am PDT live-stream Pranayama breathing on Facebook. She reminded me, and all of us, how great it is to have this one constant in our lives: our breath. With so much uncertainty, we often remind...
Compassion from the Contrasts
Years ago, I recall Gary Vaynerchuk, a bold, self-proclaimed compassionate leading entrepreneur of this digital age, discussing the “me too” stories coming out as women started to un-silence themselves about the sexual abuse they had experienced. His takeaway was...
Postures
An Invitation to Trust: Yoga Championships, Mary Jarvis, and the 60 Day Challenge
The older I get, the more I see the world as both a beautiful and yet a fallen place. I think generation after generation after generation, as we’ve heard for thousands of years, we will always have tension roaming as we vacillate from brighter to darker times, then...
Blowing in Firm Pose
Kapalbhati in Vajrasana Increases circulation Removes toxins Strengthens all abdominal organs Trims the waist line Energizing Improves mental clarity Good for high blood pressure Normalizes bowel function Blog Categories:
Spine Twisting Pose
Ardha-MatsyendrasanaIncreases circulation and nutrition to spinal nerves, veins and tissues.Improves spinal elasticity and flexibility.Opens bronchial muscles and rib cage.Firms abdomen, thighs and buttocks.Exercises digestive, endocrine, muscular, reproductive and...
Popular Posts
Story of a Yogi – Juni Sanoyca
How did I first discover Bikram yoga? Full-body aches. Numbness in my right hand. Sharp, shooting pains. I was turning 40, and I could feel my body giving up on me like an old car. After looking at my MRI scan, my doctor told me I had an “80-year-old spine.” I was...
Story of a Yogi – Bernice Buntaran
I have known about Bikram Yoga San Jose for a while. In 2005 I went to visit Michele’s first yoga studio to inquire about the practice. Several years later, I checked out her second studio not once but twice. More years passed, and I found three friends who practiced...
Story of a Yogi – Kim Jackman
I was introduced to Bikram Yoga 22 years ago by my sister-in-law in Encino after my son was born. Living in the South, she knew that heat didn’t bother me. In fact, I loved the heat and humidity. While visiting family, she said, “I’m taking you to a Bikram yoga...